Counterpoints

Jaime G. A. Grinberg's book provides rich insight into this model institution during its formative stage in the 1930s. Those of us in education schools like to pledge allegiance to the creed of pedagogical progressivism, but the staff of Bank Street in its early days zealously applied these ideas to the practice of teacher preparation, revealing just how rarely our own programs actually do so. (David Labaree, Professor of History of Education, Stanford University, and Vice President, History of Education Division, American Educational Research Association) Jaime G. A. Grinberg's book is a valuable and long-overdue case study of how cultural, political, and professional forces were negotiated in the early years of Bank Street. Thorough documentation supports his thesis that its initial independence from certain political and bureaucratic forces (being neither a credentialed nor a credentialing institution) allowed Bank Street to pursue a relatively free and open inquiry into teacher education, to develop pedagogical practices informed by that inquiry, and ultimately to construct a distinctive conception of teacher education. Such detailed historical and sociological studies of classrooms, schools and colleges of education that illuminate connections among school experience, gender, social class, and community issues are scarce in the literature. Grinberg's discoveries have important implications for contemporary educational administration, educational policy, and teacher education, particularly within the progressive tradition. (Maughn Gregory, Director, Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children, and Associate Professor of Educational Foundations, Montclair State University)