An authoritative one-volume history of the origins and development of
American higher education
This book tells the compelling saga of American higher education from
the founding of Harvard College in 1636 to the outbreak of World War II.
The most in-depth and authoritative history of the subject available,
The History of American Higher Education traces how colleges and
universities were shaped by the shifting influences of culture, the
emergence of new career opportunities, and the unrelenting advancement
of knowledge.
Roger Geiger, arguably today's leading historian of American higher
education, vividly describes how colonial colleges developed a unified
yet diverse educational tradition capable of weathering the social
upheaval of the Revolution as well as the evangelical fervor of the
Second Great Awakening. He shows how the character of college education
in different regions diverged significantly in the years leading up to
the Civil War-for example, the state universities of the antebellum
South were dominated by the sons of planters and their culture-and how
higher education was later revolutionized by the land-grant movement,
the growth of academic professionalism, and the transformation of campus
life by students. By the beginning of the Second World War, the standard
American university had taken shape, setting the stage for the postwar
education boom.
Breathtaking in scope and rich in narrative detail, The History of
American Higher Education is the most comprehensive single-volume
history of the origins and development of of higher education in the
United States.