A delayed happy birthday (May 4, 1796) to Horace Mann, ardent abolitionist, social reformer, visionary educator, and the founding President of Antioch College.
He had little formal education as a youth, but read extensively at the town library, where he learned enough to be admitted to Brown University (now a Tablet PC-digital pen centric school!).
During 12 years as secretary to what became the first state board of education (for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts), he transformed the state’s hodgepodge of charity schools for the poor into a great system of free public schools, organized on solid educational principles. His central thesis was essentially Jeffersonian–no republic can endure unless its citizens are literate and educated. In the United States of the 1830s, arguing for “common school”– that is, a school commonly supported, commonly attended by all people regardless of race, class or sex, and commonly controlled — was a radical idea.
Mann’s challenge to the Antioch College graduating class of 1859 is repeated at Antioch graduations: “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.” (bold added)
Thanks, Horace, for setting a high standard for teachers. Many educators try to reach this standard daily.
