Can We Make Education Great Again?

America used to lead the world in literacy

Pierre Samuel Du Pont de Nemours, a French doctor who nearly lost his head (quite literally) during the French Revolution, was a friend of Thomas Jefferson. In 1800, Du Pont, who had moved to America, was asked by then vice president Jefferson to write about education in the fledgling country. Du Pont’s book, National Education in The United States of America was published in French in 1812 and later translated to English in 1923. In the beginning of the book, excerpted below, Du Pont describes the state of American education in 1800.

The United States are more advanced in their educational facilities than most countries.

They have a large number of primary schools; and as their paternal affection protects young children from working in the fields, it is possible to send them to the school-master—a condition which does not prevail in Europe.

Most young Americans, therefore, can read, write and cipher. Not more than four in a thousand [0.4%] are unable to write legibly—even neatly; while in Spain, Portugal, Italy, only a sixth [~17%] of the population can read; in Germany, even in France, not more than a third [~33%]; in Poland, about two men in a hundred [2%]; and in Russia not one in two hundred [0.5%]. [Emphasis added.]

England, Holland, the Protestant Cantons of Switzerland, more nearly approach the standard of the United States, because in those countries the Bible is read; it is considered a duty to read it to children; and in that form of religion the sermons and liturgy in the language of the people tend to increase and formulate ideas of responsibility. Controversy, also, has developed argumentation and has thus given room for the exercise of logic.

In America, a great number of people read the Bible, and all the people read a newspaper. The fathers read aloud to their children while breakfast is being prepared—a task which occupies the mothers for three-quarters of an hour every morning. And as the newspapers of the United States are filled with all sorts of narratives—comments on matters political, physical, philosophic; information on agriculture, the arts, travel, navigation; and also extracts from all the best books in America and Europe—they disseminate an enormous amount of information, some of which is helpful to the young people, especially when they arrive at an age when the father resigns his place as reader in favor of the child who can best succeed him.

It is because of this kind of education that the Americans of the United States, without having more great men than other countries, have the great advantage of having a larger proportion of moderately well informed men; although their education may seem less perfect, it is nevertheless better and more equally distributed.

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In 1800, when the United States had no public schools, literacy and numeracy approached 100% of the population. Children were taught at home by parents, other relatives, or tutors, or sent to small neighborhood schools. Women operated “dame schools” in their homes to teach young children to read. Clergy taught one-room schools in their churches. Charity schools for the poor were operated by various denominations. In nearly every state, education was neither funded nor regulated by the government. Parents made appropriate educational choices for their children, and the results were outstanding. It’s time to STEP OUT of the broken system of government schooling and return to America’s historical, parent-directed, market-driven education paradigm.