Progressives worked to better American society from ensuring that everyone’s living conditions were safe and improving employee working conditions to the promotion of big business regulations and introducing methods to protect the environment and conserve resources. During the Progressive Era, supporters were also driven to ensure women had a right to vote, that election reforms were adopted and that all Americans were provided the opportunity to earn an education. In the early 1900s, school for children was not a priority and they sometimes only attended for a few years before being pulled away to work on farms and in factories to support their families. As industrialization and urbanization grew, Progressives sought out ideas to make education more readily available to all (Sicius, …show more content…
In 1868, the Department of Education was changed to the Office of Education and was no longer represented in the president’s cabinet. Without sufficient support at the federal level, the Office of Education had an uphill battle in providing their support and advice to state and local governments on educational improvements. Over the years up until the current U.S. Department of Education opened for business in May, 1980, the Office of Education had a vital impact on educational entities throughout America by providing information and guidance to established standard operating procedures for their schools (Forest & Kinser, 2002).
The Progressive Education Association (PEA) was created in 1919 by educational reformers and avid supporters of John Dewey’s progressive education movement. It was the association’s desires that the compulsory education laws be more strictly enforced, that the use of child labor be abolished and that both the school day and school year be extended for educational institutions. The PEA sponsored a landmark eight-year study that compared thousands of college students who attended both progressive high schools and