Gary (Indiana) Model

The Gary, Indiana, public schools, developed by Superintendent William A. Wirt (1874–1938), quickly grew into a famous example of progressive education. Born in eastern Indiana, Wirt attended nearby Bluffton High School, graduated from DePauw University, and returned to Blufften as school superintendent in 1899. His school innovations, particularly a diversified elementary curriculum, led to his move to Gary in 1907. Founded by U.S. Steel Corporation the previous year, Gary grew quickly and attracted a heterogeneous population, many from eastern and southern Europe.

The Work-Study-Play system, or Platoon School Plan, as it was later known, focused on two central features, but only in the elementary grades. Wirt believed in maximizing school facilities by constant use of all classrooms. He also expanded the curriculum to include manual training (e.g., shops for the boys and cooking for the girls), recreation, nature study, and daily auditorium activities. Organized into two platoons, during the morning, Platoon A students occupied the specialized academic classrooms (math, science, English, history), whereas Platoon B students were in the auditorium, shops, gardens, swimming pools, gym, or playground. They switched during the afternoon. Gary's large schools were unique because they were unit schools, including all grades, K-12. By the late 1920s, about half of the system's 22,000 students were attending such schools, with the remainder in the smaller elementary buildings.

The Work-Study-Play plan attracted national publicity, and by 1929, 202 cities had more than 1000 platoon schools. Although the Gary schools captured the positive spirit of progressive education, they also incorporated some troubling aspects. There was the perception that the inclusion of manual training classes was designed to channel the working classes (the majority of Gary's students) into vocational trades. The schools were also racially segregated. The 2,759 Black children in 1930 mostly attended all-Black elementary schools. The situation worsened as the Black enrollment increased to 6,700 by 1949 (34 percent of the student population), despite the school board's decision in 1946 to promote building integration. By 1960, 97 percent of the 23,055 Black pupils (more than half of the 41,000 students) were in eighteen, mostly Black schools. The trend would continue as the Black population increased and the White population decreased over the following decades.

[Page 363]The Gary schools barely survived the Depression years, when budgets were severely cut. Wirt's death in 1938, and a critical study in 1940, led to the slow process, not completed until the 1960s, of abandoning the platoon system and diversified curriculum, instituting the contained classroom in the elementary grades. The student population had exploded by the 1960s, but soon began to decline. There were 20,000 African American students (and few others) by 2000. Endemic social and economic problems, compounded by mandated state testing and the federal No Child Left Behind Act, put additional stress on the students and their schools.