In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, at a time when administrations in various countries set up new school systems or considered reforming existing ones, world exhibitions offered the ideal opportunity for the transnational exchange of knowledge and ideas. This article demonstrates both the impact of ideological views and individual actors on the circulation, adaptation, and dismissal of cross-border ideas and the impact of innovations on their views and actions. As such, it contributes both to our understanding of world exhibitions as mediators of educational reform and to the existing scholarship on the history of educational technology.