Teacher Corps

TEACHER CORPS

TEACHER CORPS, created by the Higher Education Act of 1965. Senators Gaylord A. Nelson of Wisconsin and Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts proposed the legislation, and President Lyndon B. Johnson gave the idea a name. This program grew out of the same Great Society optimism that fueled Head Start and Volunteers in Service to America. During its seventeen-year life, the corps conducted more than 650 projects in cities, small towns, and rural areas, focusing on educational innovation. The first broad concern of the Teacher Corps was to improve education for the disadvantaged. In the mid-1960s, policymakers likened it to the Peace Corps—idealistic young people would bring energy and commitment to schools in blighted urban areas and poor rural communities. The corps encouraged graduates of liberal arts colleges and members of minority groups to join. The perspectives of these nontraditional teachers led to curricular innovation in individual instruction and multicultural education.

A second innovation was in teacher training. After eight weeks of training, interns spent two years engaged simultaneously in university study, work-study in the schools, and work in communities, which included after-school recreation activities, home visits, and health programs. During its last years, the Teacher Corps was more concerned with in-service training for teachers already in schools, focusing on professional development and innovations among veteran teachers. Cooperation among educators was important to the Teacher Corps. The Department of Health, Education and Welfare provided funds. At the state level, college and university teachers instructed interns and consulted with local schools. School districts and community groups then utilized the interns.

Controversy surrounded the Teacher Corps from the beginning. The corps threatened the traditional rights of the states in educational matters, and issues of trust and authority simmered beneath the surface of relations between teachers and interns, school districts and universities, and the national office and local educators. Community groups were concerned about being shuffled aside. By the late 1970s, the mission of the corps became difficult to define and its varied constituents hard to satisfy. In an effort to cut back federal involvement in education, President Ronald Reagan officially eliminated the corps as part of the 1981 Education Consolidation and Improvement Act. It ceased operations in 1983.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bernstein, Irving. Guns or Butter: The Presidency of Lyndon Johnson. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Dallek, Robert. Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961–1973. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.

Kaplan, Marshall, and Peggy L. Cuciti, eds. The Great Society and Its Legacy: Twenty Years of U.S. Social Policy. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1986.

Unger, Irwin. The Best of Intentions: The Triumphs and Failures of the Great Society under Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon. New York: Doubleday, 1996.

Christine A. Ogren / a. e.

See also Education ; Great Society ; Peace Corps .