This is a thorough evaluation of the experience shared by a crucial generation of American women, widely known but never fully understood: the progressive social reformers of the early twentieth century. Lagemann portrays five such reformers, Grace Dodge, Maud Nathan, Lillian Wald, Leonora O'Reilly, and Rose Schneiderman, all of New York. Her work breaks new ground with its analysis of the forces that shaped the development of these women, their personalities, their careers, and their consciousness. Lagemann's concern is education--not in the limited sense of going to college, but education as a lifelong process of interaction that changes the self. She deals with the combined influences of pedagogy--especially that of parents, vocational mentors, and colleagues--work, and feminism. Lagemann skillfully demonstrates the effects of social, cultural, economic, and intellectual currents on the education of women in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The relationships Lagemann shows between education and individual achievement and between education and social change create a new understanding of feminism and progressivism in the early twentieth century.

The Carnegie Corporation, among this country's oldest and most important foundations, has underwritten projects ranging from the writings of David Riesman to Sesame Street. Lagemann's lively history focuses on how foundations quietly but effectively use power and private money to influence public policies.

Since its beginnings at the start of the twentieth century, educational scholarship has been a marginal field, criticized by public policy makers and relegated to the fringes of academe. "An Elusive Science" explains why, providing a critical history of the traditions, conflicts, and institutions that have shaped the study of education over the past century.

"Foundations are socially and politically significant, but thissimple fact... has mostly been ignored by students of American history.... Thiscollection represents an important contribution to an emerging field." --Kenneth Prewitt, Social Science Research Council

At a time when higher education attendance has never felt more mandatory for career success and economic growth, the distinguished contributors to this provocative collection ask readers to consider the civic mission of higher education as equally vital to the nation's well-being. Should higher education serve a greater public interest? In what ways should colleges and universities be asked to participate in public controversies? What should we expect institutions of higher education to contribute to the development of honesty and ethical judgement in the civic sphere? What should colleges do to foster greater intellectual curiosity and aesthetic appreciation in their students and communities, and why is this important for all Americans?