The History of the National Society for the Study of Education

The National Society for the Study of Education is an organization of scholars, professional educators, and policy makers dedicated to the improvement of education research, policy, and practice. Founded in 1901 by a small group of distinguished educators including John Dewey, Nicholas Murray Butler, and Charles A. McMurry, NSSE is the oldest national educational research organization in the United States. It emerged from the original National Herbart Society, which began in 1895 and which published five annual yearbooks, before being reconstituted as NSSE. The main purposes of the Society were fulfilled as members wrote monographs on important educational topics and participated in discussion of their work at regular general meetings.

As the Society continues its second century, it acknowledges its indebtedness to the numerous authors and editors whose work has made NSSE yearbooks a truly significant contribution to the study of education during the past 100 years. NSSE looks ahead to fostering stronger relationships between researchers, educators, and policy makers, with the goal of improving education for the nation’s children and youth through continued scholarship and discourse around educational problems.

As essential element of this mission is the continuation of public discourse. It is quite possible to assume that arrangements for these efforts have only become more complicated. However, one of the charming surprises of going through the Society’s archival materials is the discovery of correspondence that provides a window into its workings. Below is a February 10, 1930 letter from an aggrieved recruit who is trying to understand exactly what he is being asked to do, which opens an essay that serves as something of an introduction to the Society. Enjoy.

An Introduction to NSSE: "Society" and "Study" Over the Years

To S.D. Shankland of the National Education Association

February 10, 1930

"Some time in December I found out quite by accident that I was to appear on the program of the National Society for the Study of Education. I wrote some letters of inquiry, one to the Chairman of the committee on arithmetic, and one [to] the Chairman of the Board of Directors. One Chairman assured me that I was to appear at the first session and discuss Volume I of the Yearbook. The other assured me that I was to appear at the second session and discuss Volume II. Ever since that time I have been receiving contradictory letters continuously.

About a week ago I received another official program from [the Society's Secretary-Treasurer] which had me scheduled to appear at the second session and to criticize Volume I of the Yearbook. Today I received an official program from you which schedules me to speak at the first session of the program on Volume I of the Yearbook. Now if someone will just write to me that I am to appear at the first session and discuss Volume II of the Yearbook the possibilities will be exhausted. The copy of the material which I am to discuss just reached me this morning. I was to have had my address ready for the publicity committee some two weeks ago. If you can get any certainty out of the situation, you can do better than I can.

I am planning to be at Atlantic City at both sessions in order that I may be sure to be present when my name is called. I expect to spend at least some part of my time saying what I think about a committee which gets thing balled up in this manner."

"Very sincerely, W.J. Osborn, Director of Research, Ohio State University."

One hundred years of correspondence, minutes, and financial records might not seem like an appealing set of papers to wade through, but hidden in the archives of the National Society for the Study of Education are many small pieces of educational history.

These documents put a face on what might very well be the oldest educational organization you've never heard of. The National Society for the Study of Education has been in existence since 1901. Its beginnings can be traced to the Herbart Society, which met from 1895-1901. Members of the Herbart Society were disciples of Johann Friedrich Herbart (1776-1841), who could be thought of as the first voice of the modern era of psychoeducational thought. The goal of the Herbartians was to promote the scientific study of education, as well as the notion of teaching by means of a logical progression of learning, a revolutionary idea at the end of the 19th century.

This organization became the National Society for the Scientific Study of Education in 1901 (the "Scientific" was dropped in 1910), and has published, with few exceptions, a two-volume yearbook that examines educational issues every year since then. Authors and editors have included John Dewey; E.L. Thorndike, Carleton Washburne, Ralph W. Tyler, Robert J. Havinghurst, John Goodlad, Ann Lieberman, Milbrey McLaughlin, Ruth Strang, Jeanne S. Chall, Harry Broudy, Benjamin Bloom, Lawrence Kohlberg, Urie Bronfenbrenner, Jerome Bruner, Kenneth Strike, Michael Scriven, Elliot Eisner, Bernard Spodek, Rudolf Arnheim, Jeannie Oakes, and many other distinguished educators and scholars. Subjects of yearbooks have been far ranging, from teacher training, curriculum, and assessment to the teaching of geography, juvenile delinquency and the schools, the courts and education, and service learning. Along the way, the Society has sought not only to disseminate information through its yearbooks, but also to promote discussion and analysis of the research through a variety of venues. The significance and value of these efforts, once pioneering, has ironically contributed to the challenge now facing the Society as it looks to its second century: How best to make a contribution to scholarship and practice in a field now crowded with educational organizations and publications?

2001-2002 marked the centennial birthday of NSSE. With age comes introspection. Where, in an educational landscape crowded with journals, books, email updates and web sites, does an organization with three purposes-the investigation of educational problems; the publication of results of such investigations; and the promotion of discussion of those results-fit in? What has "Society" and "Study" meant over the past 100 years, and what should it mean now?

What does "Society" mean?

NSSE has always endeavored to promote an educational discourse among its members, chiefly at conferences and meetings, often in partnership with other organizations. As Charles A. McMurry, the Secretary of the Herbart Society, explained the Herbartian mission in 1896:

"It is the well-matured plan of the society to secure the best papers within its reach on the most vital problems of American education. These papers are printed beforehand and circulated to the members so that they may be carefully read and weighed before the time for discussion in the [National Education Association] meetings. The publications may then be taken home and their practical value tested. This plan provides for very careful preparation of papers, thorough and complete discussion after thoughtful reading, and the later study, testing and application of the theories proposed. In this way it is believed that progress can be made toward the settlement of some of our vexed questions of education."

A "Proposed Plan of Work," included in NSSE's first yearbook (1902) elaborated on the optimal setting for discourse:

"The best results are not likely to be attained in large assemblages of several hundred teachers where elaborate speeches are to be made, but rather in informal round-table discussions, where truth may be sought by candid interchange of opinions, by question and answer, and by simple discussion, free from oratory. It seems advisable also to hold a second meeting, for all the members of the society, where the whole subject is thrown open to popular discussion. Such as been the character heretofore of meetings of the Herbart Society, and they seem to have served an excellent purpose."

Early records of the Society indicate strong commitment of the part of members to educational inquiry and discussion. Two or three meetings were held each year, and at these times members would report on their own studies. Often summaries of the work were distributed to members prior to meetings to facilitate discourse. Minutes of these meetings began to be printed at the back of Yearbooks, starting in 1904, and it is clear that the conversations were vigorous and stimulating. Indeed, M.J. Holmes, secretary of the society in 1905, noted in his introduction to Part II of the Fourth Yearbook, "Non-members should not be granted the floor unless invited. At one meeting a man who neither understood nor sympathized with the work of the Society delivered a five-minute criticism telling what the Society ought and ought not to do."

As early as 1905, it was apparent that ".as the society's membership increased and as the number of non-members attracted to its meetings also increased, the meetings gradually shifted in character, so that the formal presentation of addresses came to assume more, and the discussions less importance-a change which many members deplored, but which it has seem impossible to avoid." By 1919, over 1000 people attended NSSE's annual meetings, generally held in conjunction with the National Education Association.

In 1924, the governance of NSSE changed radically, as the traditional president, vice-president, executive committee configuration was replaced by a six-person Board of Directors, who elected a chair among themselves. Rotating three-year terms on the Board were thought to be a way to "…guarantee democratic representation and freedom from domination by a self-perpetuating ring," according to Guy Whipple, Secretary-Treasure of the Society, in 1941.

Looking at the record, it is clear that not everyone agreed that such a system worked. The April 1931 minutes recount a "protest meeting" instigated by Dr. Harold Rugg at a recent NEA conference, at which “the National Society and its Board of Directors had been criticized as being ultra-conservative and unwilling to give proper representation on its Yearbook committees and on its programs of Yearbooks to the ‘progressive cohorts’.”

February 1940's minutes record a communication from a member who felt "he could not honestly vote at all on the names presented on the final ballot because he believed that the Society should have the benefit of at least one Director with the teacher's practical point of view." (In response, the Board voted to change the wording of the annual ballot to reflect association with a particular position rather than with an institution.) Ernest Horn noted in a 1951 address commemorating NSSE's first fifty years that "Sometimes the need for a yearbook is suggested to the Board by a member or group of members of the Society. This has not happened as often as it should, due no doubt to the fact that, with the increase in numbers, the members have tended to become readers rather than active participants." NSSE archives hold a number of letters to the Board that over decades reveal at least some perception of the Board as a rather closed organization. One board member noted, as late as 1997, that her students thought NSSE had "an incredibly low profile-almost like a secret exclusive organization, which you only know exists if you are a graduate student at the very good research university."

Concerns about membership, both in terms of numbers and in terms of active involvement, are a theme throughout NSSE minutes starting in the 1930's. This went hand in hand with concerns about the financial stability of NSSE, given that membership dues have always been a significant portion of the operating budget. Serious financial concerns began in the 1960s, as membership declined after a high of about 5300 in 1959. 1960s-era minutes reflect another new concern: how to attract and keep younger members, and how to involve them meaningfully.

An informal survey of NSSE members in 1999 revealed that 55% of its membership came from the ranks of higher education (administration and faculty); 18% were public school administrators; 8% were librarians at universities and colleges; 6% were graduate students and only were 2% public school teachers. Policy makers were conspicuously absent. There has been a concerted effort in the last few years to reach out to administrators, policy makers, and graduate students, and efforts continue to find ways to broaden membership in the Society.

From very early on, NSSE participated in national conferences hosted by organizations such as the National Education Association, the American Educational Research Association, the American Association of School Administrators, and the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. The new yearbooks were presented and questions and discussion followed. Some of these associations have diminished, although presentations at AERA have continued, and there is a renewed interest in playing a role at national conferences as well as NSSE-sponsored forums.

Other possible venues for NSSE presentations have been explored. In 1983, having local meetings on current educational issues on university campuses around the country was suggested, and these did take place at Ohio State University and Teachers College. 1985's minutes detail a discussion during which one board member encouraged NSSE to ".envision its yearbooks as being prepared in the context of 'combative scholarship.' If there were broad interest in yearbook topics, meetings [with other organizations] could be planned to allow for genuine discussion of various points of view. .Perhaps a group of "firebrands" in [organizations other than NSSE] could be identified [to take part]." These intriguing possibilities unfortunately competed with the demands of producing two high quality volumes every year, along with the processing of memberships and other related administrative duties, that occupied significant amounts of time for the one person who has always lived with NSSE on a daily basis, the Secretary-Treasurer.

Currently, belonging to NSSE essentially means the delivery of a yearbook, in two parts, every spring. However, the move from its home of almost forty years at the University of Chicago's Judd Hall in 2000 prompted a new resolve to revisit the notion of "Society" and what NSSE membership should mean. It is clear that the Society needs to expand its membership both within and beyond higher education. Policy makers, practitioners, administrators and principals, and the general public benefit from increased familiarity with useful research and a discourse that is inclusive and that highlights connections between policy and practice. NSSE in its second century is a meaningful forum for fostering such connections.

What does "study" mean?

Stephen Corey, board member and chair of NSSE at its 50th anniversary, observed:

"I hesitate to say so, but I believe that we pedagogues tend to exaggerate greatly the amount of change in educational practice that results from reading what other people say should be done...I would like to feel that one of the major purposes of the yearbooks of the National Society is to provoke large numbers of teachers and administrators to go about their own work more studiously and more scientifically. One way of working toward this objective would be not only to describe in the yearbooks the results of studies conducted by educational experts, but to go beyond this and suggest how teachers and administrators and supervisors themselves might study the problems they are facing that involve reading, or vocational education, or the community school or methods of teaching. Reading the results of scientific investigations conducted by somebody else is quite different in its implications for learning and change from applying the scientific method to a study of one's own activities…"

Many early NSSE Yearbooks were actually the result of committees created to study a particular issue; findings were then written up and published. The Committee on the Economy of Time in Education (17th Yearbook), the Society's Committee on Silent Reading (20th Yearbook), and the Society's Committee on Arithmetic (29th Yearbook) were among those formally named; others did not label themselves committees as such, but nonetheless undertook serious investigation of educational issues. Proposals came from Board members, members at large, and educational figures not associated with the Society in a formal way. The most noted scholars in relevant fields were recruited by a yearbook committee's chair; a sum of money was allocated for committee meetings and other expenses; and work commenced. The time between commission of a yearbook and its publication, then as now, was usually two to three years.

In 1963, the title "chairman" was replaced by "editor," marking a shift in the organization of yearbook work away from committee-led efforts. In the 1970s, the yearbooks began to be organized more as they are today: a group of authors contributing chapters under the direction of an editor who tended to be recruited by a Board member. The Society has never seemed to have a difficult time persuading well-known scholars and practitioners to contribute to yearbooks, judging from the names associated with them.

Whether the Society should support specific efforts or initiatives through its selection of topics has been an ongoing question. NSSE walks a fine line between advocacy and neutrality, given that it represents a varied membership. Historically, it has sometimes come under fire for being too cautious in its choices. A few examples: George S. Counts led an attack on NSSE's "conservatism" in 1931 (and managed to get himself elected to the Board, though he failed to attend meetings once elected and eventually resigned). Proponents of progressive education felt that their philosophy was not recognized by the Society all throughout the 1930's, and let NSSE boards know. And the February 1945 minutes include a report on a proposal for a yearbook on the "Education of Minority Groups." The decision to reject the proposal reads, in part:

"...inequality in education among racial and cultural groups is recognized as a significant problem. There are factual findings on the psychological aspects of the problem which contribute to an understanding of the problem... The effort to formulate a reasoned plan for remedying the situation would raise questions of social theory which are more or less controversial in many social situations and so highly controversial in particular localities that a yearbook committee would likely encounter great difficulty in dealing with the problem effectively."

The vantage point of over one hundred years has also served to underscore that many educational issues and their "solutions" are perennial. Over the years, there have been volumes on testing and assessment, teacher preparation, preparing students for the work world and for citizenship, educational philosophy, learning and instruction, meeting the needs of students, and other areas that continue to provoke discussion and debate.

How successful NSSE yearbooks are in influencing educational practice today remains unclear, and how often teachers or administrators have been inspired to examine and experiment with their own practice as a result of exposure to a yearbook, as Corey suggested, cannot be determined. While the Society today cannot compete with journals and the Internet in presenting state of the art research in its yearbooks, due to the time lag between commission and production, it has traditionally offered authoritative empirical and theoretical analysis-grounded in a historical context-of contemporary educational issues. In a time of sound bites and "accountability on demand" such a perspective has enormous value as we consider educational policy and avenues for the future.

How best to diversify NSSE's model of "study" is a crucial question. Providing useful and stimulating information, theory, and data to those involved in education in a variety of settings, including the Internet; more frequent smaller-scale publications, possibly geared to particular interest groups and affording opportunities for members to contribute more easily; regional meetings and conferences; recognition of graduate work; and sponsorship of longitudinal research are all under consideration. More forceful advocacy on educational issues, bolstered by the contextual perspective that is NSSE's forte, is another possibility. Above all, providing attractive opportunities for practitioners, policy makers, scholars and other stakeholders in education to engage in consultation and inquiry together must once more come to the fore as the linchpin of the Society's mission and purpose.

What does the future hold?

For the last decade of the twentieth century, the number one topic on NSSE board agendas had been the future of the Society. Aware of the imminent retirement of its long-time Secretary-Treasurer, Ken Rehage; the elimination of the Education Department at the University of Chicago, leaving NSSE homeless; and declining membership, NSSE officers truly were at a fork in the road. Most felt there were three courses of action: dissolution, continuation of yearbook production only, or an overhaul of the organization with a clear mission and unique purpose above and beyond publishing.

NSSE's Board has made a commitment to the third option. While reaffirming the importance of continuing to publish an annual two-volume yearbook, the Society's members are contributing to an ongoing discussion about other options. There is a strong belief that the legacy of NSSE should be continued through a modern version of those spirited discussions at the turn of the century. There is no reason to abandon discourse around new Yearbooks, and there is every reason to promote stronger research-based dialogue linking policy and practice.

The recommendations offered by Stephen Corey at the end of his speech in 1951 still resonate today. He said that NSSE needed to "..make arrangements for much more widespread discussions of the Society's publications; give careful and serious consideration to the difficult problem of making the yearbooks not only reports of educational investigations already conducted, but also volumes that would provoke all of us engaged in the practice of education to study our own problems more scientifically; and find ways of involving the total membership of the Society both in the selection of topics for yearbooks and in their evaluation."

As the National Society for the Study of Education continues its second century, we look to those words as a blueprint for the future.