News

Emeritus Fellowships are intended to support the scholarly activities of outstanding faculty members in the humanities and humanistic social sciences who, at the time of taking up the fellowships, will be officially retired but continue to be active and productive in their fields. In addition, the program provides institutions with resources to defray incremental costs associated with the fellows.

Professor Carl Kastle has been awarded a Mellon Emeritus Fellowship from the Andrew Mellon Foundation to support the following research project:

Uncertain Mandate:

The Role of the Federal Government in Education,

1940-1980

In the immediate aftermath of World War II, despite the immense expansion of the federal government's budget and repertoire, the United States hewed to its strong preference for state and local control of public schools. Eventually, in the vortex of international competition and the civil rights movement, the federal government became more involved in elementary and secondary education. Even in 2009, however, the United States remains decidedly more devoted to local and state control of education than other nations. Is our federal government over-weaning or anemic when it comes to education?

Uncertain Mandate will examine moments when the federal role escalated, but it will also ask how and why opponents prevailed at some points. The book will be neither a celebration nor a condemnation of a federal role in education. The federal role was hotly contested but grew considerably during the four decades from 1940 to 1980. Nonetheless, there were continual debates, substantial doubts, and periods when increased federal involvement was rejected. The same antinomy characterizes the decades since 1980. These I shall address in an Epilogue.

From the time of Thucydides' Peloponnesian Wars to the present, readers have testified to their belief that history can deepen their understanding of their own time and their options for the future. Although history cannot predict what will happen nor provide certain guidance for action, historical accounts can plumb the evolution of powerful ideas, interpret the emerging structure of institutions, and ponder why some contending groups prevailed over others along the way. As Uncertain Mandate will demonstrate, the search for an appropriate, effective federal role in education is necessarily an ongoing quest.