OF The Public Secondary OF The United States PUBLISHED BY ALBANY, N. Y. By Willard Walter Patty, A.B., M.A. Ph.D. PREFACE The past century has witnessed a marvelous transformation in the secondary education program of the United States. The most significant characteristics of this evolution have been: (1) phenomenal growth in number of schools; (2) tremendous increases in enrollments and attendance; (3) expansion of the secondary curricula and the addition of many services contemplated to meet more nearly the needs of the new student bodies; (4) provisions of more adequate buildings, equipment, and supplies to facilitate the successful operation of the developing program; and (5) mounting costs of public secondary education as a result of attempting to equalize educational opportunities of the youths of this democracy. The development of the present secondary education program has been achieved only by necessarily large expenditures of money. It cannot be hoped that we will be able to maintain our present program and continue the proper development of the work without increasingly large annual investments of our nation's resources. The increasing complexity of organization, the widening scope of activity, and the mounting cost of the public secondary education program indicate that education is becoming a business activity of importance as well as being an art, a science, and a very important human welfare activity. This is a report of an investigation of the constitutional and statutory provisions relating to public secondary education in the United States, and the decisions of the courts relative thereto. The purpose of the study is to find and synthesize constitutional and statutory provisions relating to the public secondary education program, and the decisions of the courts interpreting the same. The writer gratefully acknowledges his indebtedness to the individuals whose stimulating criticisms and en |
