Quantifying to Reform

This article examines the development of statistically oriented school administration in the early-twentieth-century United States. It analyzes the work of its specialists through their studies of students’ falling behind and dropping out of school. These issues first emerged in the “Progressive Era,” which was characterized by the professionalization and universitarization of school administration and debates over social inequality and the effectiveness of public institutions. Using these specialists’ surveys to appreciate their work, we contribute to the social history of school statistics by identifying the scientific, political and administrative issues that affect the production of statistics. As early as the 1900s, these groundbreaking surveys raised questions that would have a lasting impact on the sociology of education.