Last September at an International Curriculum Conference at Oxford University, John Goodlad, Dean of the School of Education at the University of California, Los Angeles, and one of the prime movers of American education, pronounced the requiem for what he called the “discipline-centered” curriculum movement which began in 1951. Just as Progressive Education and its late-blooming progeny, Life Adjustment Education, dominated American educational thinking from the Thirties to the early Fifties, so “discipline centered” curriculum reform, beginning with establishment of the National Science Foundation in 1951 and the MLA's FL program a year later, seems now to have run its course. Thus Dean Goodlad looks for new commitments and new values to shape our teaching efforts during the generation ahead.

You have heard about the fellow standing on the gallows about to be hanged who said, “I don't know why I am here but this will teach me a lesson.” I am that fellow, and the lesson is to watch out for John Fisher's flattering invitations to address this distinguished audience. The flattery didn't wear off until I sat down a week ago to put something on paper and suddenly realized that my knowledge of junior colleges was clearly insufficient to say anything important in only twenty minutes. But here I am. My consolation is the suspicion that many of you don't know much about junior colleges either. So let's begin, as Alice said, at the beginning.