Sputnik and the Role of Science, Math and Technology in American Education

Here's a link to our work on the history of science, 
technology, engineering and math in America

On October 4, 1957 the Soviet Union set a new trajectory for education in America.  Before the launch of Sputnik (the first satellite ever to achieve Earth orbit), American education had been a local matter, focused on community and citizenship.  After Sputnik, the security and future of democracy seemed to hinge instead on winning a global battle with communism for domination of the world. As Marion B. Folsom, Secretary of HEW put it in his speech to the AFL/CIO two months after the Sputnik launch, “Whether we like it or not…[o]ne of the fundamental facts of our times is that America is a leader among the forces of freedom against the forces of tyranny in a contest which extends around the world.  And education will play a crucial role in determining which system triumphs in the end.”

On this anniversary of the Sputnik launch, let’s take a look together at three documents from our collection to examine the historical shift in American education at the Sputnik moment, and perhaps also for how we might think about science, math and technology in American education today. 

(1) A November 11, 1957 press statement announcing therelease of “Education in the USSR,” a study completed by the Department of Health Education and Welfare (HEW) shortly after the Sputnik launch;

(2) “The Challenge in Education,” a speech by Marion B. Folsom, Secretary of HEW, to the AFL/CIO on December 5, 1957; and
(3) “Education and Industry,” a speech to the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce by John A. Perkins, Under-Secretary of HEW on October 10, 1957.

The Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW) released “Education in the USSR” a month after the Sputnik launch.  They had been working on it for two years. 

Bill de Blasio Fights to Build Public School Annex in Borough Park

Council Member Bill de Blasio with students at an
elementary school in Brooklyn, April 8, 2002.

Council member Bill de Blasio and P.S. 39 principal 

Anita de Paz applaud with first and second grade artists, 

at children's art exhibition, May 12, 2008

From 2002 to 2009, Bill de Blasio represented the 39th Council District in the Council of the City of New York. The LaGuardia and Wagner Archives houses his Council member papers, which consist of Constituent Correspondence, Departmental Correspondence, Photographs, Committee Files, and Legislative Files on education, housing, and land use. Most significantly, we have identified the papers in his collection that document his dedication to improving the quality of public education in New York City, epitomized by his role in building the P.S. 160 Annex in Borough Park, Brooklyn. (Click here to view documents related to the P.S. 160 Annex.)

In 2008, de Blasio, an education activist who earlier had been elected to his local school board, responded to his constituents’ growing concerns about the overcrowding of P.S. 160 in Borough Park. He rallied the Department of Education, fellow politicians, and local residents to build an annex to P.S. 160.  The school was originally built in 1904 for only 500 students, but by 2008 housed 821 students, or 137% of its intended capacity. Built to be handicap accessible, the five story annex houses labs, classrooms for the upper grades, an auditorium, a library, a gymnasium and serves as a community center for the neighborhood. 

A Stinging Critique of College Athletics by the Eminent Historian John Hope Franklin

Steven A. Levine

Coordinator for Educational Programs

More than 20 years before the accusations of sexual assault and rape in the athletics programs of Syracuse and Penn State Universities, the eminent historian John Hope Franklin delivered a stinging critique of college athletics and their deleterious effects on higher education in a LaGuardia Lecture hosted by La Guardia Community College at the CUNY Graduate Center in 1989.  It is now available on the Featured page of the LaGuardia and Wagner Archives Website http://www.laguardiawagnerarchive.lagcc.cuny.edu/featured.aspx  and on You Tube http://www.youtube.com/user/lagarchivist?feature=g-all#p/u/42/3_GeAo3WzXQ 

You can also learn more about intercollegiate athletics on the Archives' Investing in Futures: Public Higher Education in American website.  http://www.cuny.edu/site/cc/higher-education/intercollegiate-athletics.html and in The Chronicle of Higher Education commentaries called, "What the Hell Has Happened to College Sports? And What We Should Do About It?"http://chronicle.com/article/What-the-Hell-Has-Happened-to/130071/?sid=wb&utm_source=wb&utm_medium=en

Professor Franklin's words felt prescient to me and I wanted to share them with you. I hope you will take the time to consider the role and meaning of athletics in higher education and send us your comments.