Ethical Culture Fieldston School records
Ethical Culture Fieldston School
The documents in the collection are in English.
The Ethical Culture Fieldston School records provide information on the administrative and academic affairs of the school from the 1880s into the twenty-first century. Themes seen throughout include progressive education, independent school administration, curriculum creation, fundraising, and budgeting. The role of ethics, arts, or sports programs in the curriculum, and the school's response to greater societal issues such as wars, racism, poverty, and environmental concerns, are often addressed.
Pre-1940 materials in the collection strongly reflect the school's early interest in "manual training" through graphic arts, mechanics, and practical skills curriculum. Later records tend to reflect the school's interest in social progressivism and move toward a college preparatory focus. In addition, the collection contains materials related to extracurricular and summer programs in several record groups, but particularly in "RG 6: Camps and Programs." In addition, "RG 2: Early and Defunct Schools" contains records of the Normal Teacher Training Department.
Themes also seen throughout the collection include: changes in standardization of education and college admissions process (see especially the records of the Eight Year Study in "RG 3: Fieldston School"), the challenges of serving underprivileged communities in an elite institution, and the rise of student activism and a changing adolescent culture beginning in the late 1960s. This last is documented in particular through the protests of the Black and Latino Students Club in 1970, which are discussed in several record groups.
Materials relating to constituent management, particularly parental involvement in school and the maintenance of alumni relations, can be found in several record groups, but especially in "RG 8: Alumni and Alumni Relations" and in "RG 9: Development and Communications."
Information about physical locations at 33 Central Park West and the Fieldston campus in the Bronx can be found in "RG 10: Buildings and Grounds," as well as in "RG 14: Photographs" and in the Board of Governors and administration records in "RG 1: Governance, Administration, and 3-School Affairs." This includes images, architectural plans, and discussion of maintenance, budgets, and space usage.
While the philosophical influence of the Society for Ethical Culture can be seen in administrative and curriculum materials throughout the collection, directly related items consist of Society-produced ephemera, discussion of shared spaces at the Central Park West location, and the financial and legal documents detailing the dissolution of financial ties formalized in 1996.
Correspondence, meeting materials, and administrative documents make up much of the collection, along with ephemera, curriculum materials, student work, and a significant number of photographs. Most materials were created by the 3-School administration, or by the administration of individual schools, with some materials created or collected by teachers or students. Beginning in the 1980s, the Alumni Affairs department played a large role in growing the archival collection by saving contemporary items and collecting donations of older items from alumni and their descendants.
A very small amount of records relate to photographer Lewis Hine, who taught photography at the Ethical Culture School in the early twentieth century. "RG 14: Photographs" contains copy photographs and copy negatives, along with two photographs marked as possible Hine images. Other mentions of Hine in the collection are later correspondence related to archival inquiries or publicity efforts. Also, while there are very few items directly related to the school's many notable alumni, possible sources of information on individual students include class lists and student rosters from 1891 onward, as well as Fieldston yearbooks and the Fieldston News student newspaper after 1928 found in "RG 11: Print Matter."
More detailed information can be found in the description for each individual Record Group and Series. Researchers should be aware that Columbia University Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the papers of founder Felix Adler (The Felix Adler papers, 1830-1933), as well as records relating to Adler's successor as rector, John Lovejoy Elliott, in the Hudson Guild records, 1896-1990s.
This finding aid was produced using ArchivesSpace on 2023-09-05 10:55:10 -0400.
Using Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language: Finding aid written in English
New-York Historical Society