ABSTRACT
By 1920 the publication of Cardinal Principles and the incorporation of vocational education in the programs of the comprehensive high schools had put American secondary education on a new course. The high school set out to transform itself from a school for a selected few into a home for the many. At the end of the decade the U.S. Office of Education certified success: secondary education was being democratized. Public high school enrollment had climbed to 46.6 percent of the age cohort. Additional thousands were reached through vocational programs in regular high schools and continuation and evening classes. In junior high school classes the replacement of traditional academic subjects such as arithmetic or algebra with “general mathematics” for all brought students of various interests and abilities together. The same unifying effect was at work in high school choruses, glee clubs, bands, and orchestras, in courses in art appreciation, and in interscholastic contests of various kinds.1
