EDUCATIONAL PLANNING: PURPOSES AND POWER.

Until recently, the federal government has not considered urban education a matter of high national priority. The great land grants of the 18th and 19th centuries were designed for the benefit of rural populations in largely rural states. An elementary education enough to enable laborers to count change and to decipher a bill of lading was all that was required for most jobs. Skills were learned through apprenticeships; many professions, through internships; local citizenship and politics, through bloody noses. Post-elementary education was for the few. Irishmen and women were not welcomed. It was not until the lifetime of this writer that a high school education became a reasonable expectation for more than a small minority of the American population. It is within the lifetime of this writer's children that some form of college education has been a meaningful option for the children of the American majority. Even with substantial infusions of federal funds in recent years, urban education in central cities is facing a mounting financial crisis.