The High School Journal

With this issue, The High School Journal celebrates the beginning of its 101st year of publication. Achieving this milestone provides us with the opportunity to reflect upon our longevity and contemplate our future.

Evolving from The North Carolina High School Bulletin, published quarterly from 1910-1917, The High School Journal changed its name and scope with its first issue in January 1918. The original issues of The High School Journal were published at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with two key purposes in mind: to improve the quality of teaching in the high schools of North Carolina and to examine the form and function of the high school, especially in regards to how best to meet the needs of democracy (Walker, Noble, Chase, & Williams, 1918). Published with an intended audience of teachers, administrators, and superintendents, the journal was filled with book reviews, columns rooted in the pedagogical lives of various disciplines, and news from groups close to the heart of the managing editor, Nathan W. Walker. In essence, the journal served as a newsletter of sorts including regular reports from the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools (SACS), the North Carolina College Conference, the North Carolina High School Debating Union, and the North Carolina Athletic Association. The journal held true to its North Carolina roots in these first years, with local interest stories such as "Winston Salem's Proposed High School" (Walker, 1919), "Asheville Normal and Associated Schools" (Calfee, 1922), and "Music in Craven County" (Bourdblais, 1921). Columns focused on disciplinary teaching also proliferated, with G. A. Harrer's "The Latin Column" first appearing in 1921. It was quickly followed by other regular columns focused on the teaching of English, Spanish, French, Mathematics, and German.

The twentieth anniversary edition of The High School Journal, published in January 1938, reaffirmed the mission described in the January 1918 editorial. While remaining true to the original mission, the 1938 editorial called for broadening the scope of the journal to reach an audience beyond North Carolina. This expanded scope was apparent in the editorials printed with some regularity through 1952. These editorials evolved from lists of various announcements along with short opinion pieces on topics such as "Local Participation in School Support" (school funding; Maaske, 1939) and "School Board Responsibilities" (Phillips, 1939) in the late 1930s to more traditionally written editorials on topics such as "War" (Ryan, 1942) and "Church and State" (Holton, 1950) in the 1940s and early 1950s. Strikingly, the editorials neglected to address the nation's growing concern with racial issues, with the sole exception of the October 1946 editorial entitled "Curriculum Revision for Intergroup Understanding" (Ryan, 1946). However, articles such as "The South, Democracy and the Negro" (Taylor, 1944) and "Some Economic, Political, and Social Influences on Education in the South" (Knight, 1945) portrayed various perspectives on the topic. Finally, in November 1968, The High School Journal published a special themed volume entitled "Disadvantaged Students". This issue was groundbreaking for the Journal, as it was the [End Page 73] first volume to center racial inequalities in schools, albeit through the problematic lens of "disadvantaged" and "culturally deprived" students.

In 1978, at the ripe old age of 60, The High School Journal announced a new direction. Ira J. Gordon, the Dean of UNC-Chapel Hill School of Education, set forth two objectives in the April 1978 edition: influencing education policy and assisting teachers and administrators by reporting best-practices in secondary education (Gordon, 1978). He called for high-quality research written for both policy makers and practitioners, initiating the idea of peer review and promising answers to some of the largest questions of the day centering around the high school. This issue also marked the beginning of Gerald Unks' service as Editor. As editor, Dr. Unks rechristened the editorial section "The Front Line" and featured such titles as "School: The Static Monopoly" (1979) and "Teaching by Torment" (1980). While the HSJ continued to publish articles like "Accommodating Individual Differences in Content Classrooms" (Moore & Readance, 1981) aimed at practitioners, many of the articles had a sharper edge, such as Mueller's 1982 "Huddled Masses in the Classroom" which...