Factory model school

"Factory model school" and "factory model education" are terms used to describe educational organization and facilities. The terms emerged in the mid to late-20th century as a rhetorical device used by speakers and writers advocating for a change to the American public education system. Generally speaking when people use the term, they are referencing characteristics of European education that emerged in the late 18th Century and then in North America in the mid-19th century that include: top-down management, standardization, outcomes designed to meet societal needs, age-based classrooms, efficiency, and a focus on producing results. The phrase is typically used in the context of discussing what the author identifies as negative aspects of public (or government-funded) school. For example, the factory model of schools are "designed to create docile subjects and factory workers.” Educational historians generally recognize the phrase as misleading and an inaccurate representation of the development of American public education.

History of the Terms

The first public use of the term "factory model schools" to describe K-12 education was by Dr. Howard Lamb in a speech in September, 1972. The Greenville News reported: "The educational institutions are producing teachers for the 1920 factory model schools, Lamb said." Previously, Theresa Jablonski, in a 1970 editorial in the News Herald (Franklin, Pennsylvania), referenced "factory model of education" to describe college classrooms. Although it's likely that neither Jablonski or Lamb originated the term, their usage represents the terms' first appearance in the media.

In a 1989 piece in The Phi Delta Kappa, "The Horse is Dead", Dr Leslie A. Howard connected the term to Horace Mann's experiences in Prussia in 1843. Howard's piece was cited in numerous educational philosophy and theory texts in the 1980's and 1990's. The phrase was used by education leaders including Marilyn Roth of the National Education Association in 1987. Al Shanker, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, referenced the concept in a 1989 speech, "The Revolution that is Overdue: From Information Factory to Learning and Teaching in Restructuring Schools."

John Taylor Gatto's book The Underground History of Education published in 2001 linked the idea of a "factory school" directly to Horace Mann. Gatto's text has been cited by multiple non-fiction books on education including The End of Average by Todd Rose (2015) and Schools on Trial by Nikhil Goyal (2016), both of which use the analogy to advocate a particular set of changes.

"Factory Model" as an Analogy

In some cases, authors have used the term "factory model" as an analogy. As a modern example, the animation and text of Sir Ken Robinson's TedTalk compares students in schools to raw goods in a factory and references children's "date of manufacturing" as a sorting mechanism. This clearest example of this in historical writing is in the research of Raymond E. Callahan, especially in Education and the Cult of Efficiency (1962). Callahan explored the relationship between public education and the emerging concept of Scientific Management in the 1910s and included quotes by school leaders who spoke of children as the "raw goods" schools were meant to mold into something better. The most prolific user of this analogy Ellwood Patterson Cubberley, who saw the logical, methodical approach of scientific management as a way for public education to adapt to influxes of immigrants, Black American children, and female students that were entering into the system and ensure the best outcomes. Cubberley wrote numerous guides for school administrators as well as a history book and was one of the most widely read educational authors of the 1910s and 1920s. He frequently used the analogy of school as a factory and it's not uncommon for modern day authors to take his comments out of context.

A theory that deeply informed school leaders during this period was the work of Frederick Taylor. His approach to time management was known as Taylorism and it influenced all aspects of American society, including education. An example of its adoption in the home are the experiences of Lillian and Frank Gilbreth, whose scientific approach to parenting was described in their son's book Cheaper By the Dozen. In schools, this philosophical approach - that any problem could be solved by breaking it down into smaller units and consider time costs - was used in a variety of ways. A group of English teachers in 1913 aggregated how much time they spend grading papers and used their findings to appeal to school leaders for more time to grade and provide feedback.

Although the phrase didn't become a part of educational discourse until the 1990's, David B. Tyack, a leader in the field of educational history, provided a context for it in his history of American urban education, The One Best System (1974). "Just as eighteenth-century theologians could think of God as a clock-maker without derogation, so the social engineers searching for new organizational forms used the words 'machine' and 'factory' without investing them with the negative associations they evoke today." This idea that school leaders spoke about factories as a frame of reference is also explained in Pillars of the Republic, Common Schools and American Society, 1780-1860 by Carl Kaestle (1983).

Schools thus became in some respects like factories, but not necessarily because they were mimicking factories, or preparing children to work in factories. Rather, both the workplace and the schools, as well as other nineteenth-century institutions, were partaking of the same ethos of efficiency, manipulation, and mastery. (p. 90).

Problems with and Critiques of the Terms

Setting aside that school leaders around the turn of 20th century used factories as an analogy and not a philosophical foundation, there are at least two problems with the terms.

Mann's Reports from Prussia

Horace Mann presented his thoughts following his trip to Prussia in a report to the Massachusetts Board of Education. He had filed several reports previously and his 7th report spoke about his experiences in Europe. Filed in 1844, the report contains no reference to Prussian factories nor mention of concepts like efficiency, trained workers, or docile children. While this alone isn't sufficient to refute claims about a factory model mentality informing the development of American schools, it does challenge claims by authors like Gatto that Mann was eager to replicate a model of education that would train children to work in factories.

The "Look" of Factories Around the Time of the Common School Movement

Factories that existed around the time of Mann and the spread of the common school movement don't resemble factories in the way we think of them today. The most in-depth look at the discrepancy between the phrase and the actual look of schools in the 1840's is The Invented History of 'The Factory Model of Education' by Audrey Watters. Even though historians have taken different perspectives on the influence of merchants and manufacturers on the rise of the Common School movement, there is a general consensus that the goal of education for most of American history, especially at the primary levels, has been about general knowledge, not the specific skills required for factory work.