Numerous studies have analysed the relationships between the implementation of the railroad within a territory and the demographic, urban, or economic development in that territory. The aim of this study deviates somewhat to focus on the possible repercussions of the railroad line in terms of reducing illiteracy rates in Extremadura (Spain)…

After the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920), the Mexican government sought to establish a series of frontier schools along the United States-Mexico border in an attempt to keep what officials believed were its most economically valuable citizens from migrating to the United States in search of improved economic and educational opportunities. This…

Sweden's first Elementary School Act of 1842 stated that every parish was obliged to organise and fund schools to be offered to all children in the parish. Many parishes were poor and had a difficult time funding schools. In some parishes, local industries, such as ironworks, organised, funded, and managed schools for their workers. Even though…

Martin Luther's reflections on education and schooling are summarised in two short texts (Wittenberg, 1524 and 1530) addressed respectively to the municipal authorities and to parents. Nevertheless, the subject of education permeates his whole work, emerging in several other treatises and commentaries. His passionate eloquence refers often to…

This text focuses on municipalities from an educational and cultural perspective. Over the last 200 years, municipalities have played a fundamental role in the creation of guiding principles and educational norms and conventions. They have participated in the supply and universalisation of schooling and have contributed to integrating the public…

In the past decades, a body of international research concerning residential institutions for children emerged. This article focuses on the history of the Ghent orphanages (1945-1984). First, the population of the more than 1200 children and young people resident in the orphanages between 1945 and 1984 is analysed. This analysis illustrates a…

There are two peculiar moments in the history of the "struggle for national education", which, specifically in the city of Sao Paulo, capital of the State of Sao Paulo, one of the major and richest cities in Brazil, produced very interesting results in school architecture. The first moment happened in the period called the "First…