Thomas Jefferson's involvement with and support of education is best known through his founding of the University of Virginia, which he established in 1819 as a secular institution after he left the presidency of the United States. Jefferson believed that libraries and books were so integral to individual and institutional education that he designed the university around its library.
In 1779, in "A Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge," Jefferson proposed a system of public education to be tax-funded for 3 years for "all the free children, male and female," which was an unusual perspective for the time period. They were allowed to attend longer if their parents, friends, or family could pay for it independently.
In his book Notes on the State of Virginia (1785), Jefferson had scribed his ideas for public education at the elementary level. Charles F. Mercer authored a report in the state legislature in 1816 calling for state supported primary schooling for all white children. Supervision was to be provided by a state Board of Public Instruction, chosen by the legislature. In 1817, his bill passed the lower house but died in the state senate. Jefferson opposed the plan because heavy funding for primary schools would divert money from his beloved state university, and the plan would replace local control by state control.Thomas Hunt, "MERCER, CHARLES FENTON" in Richard J. Altenbaugh, ed. Historical dictionary of American education (1999) p. 230. On Jefferson's letter in opposition see Alfred J. Morrison, The beginnings of public education in Virginia, 1776-1860; study of secondary schools in relation to the state Literary fund (1917) pp 34-35 and Dumas Malone, Jefferson and His Time: vol 6 The Sage of Monticello (1977) pp. 251-253.
In 1817 he proposed and won passage of a plan for a university of Virginia to be named "Central College". The university was to be the capstone, available to only the best selected students. The state provided only $15,000 a year and Virginia did not establish free public education in the primary grades until after the Civil War under the Reconstruction era legislature.Malone, Jefferson and His Time: vol 6 The Sage of Monticello (1977) pp. 267-282.
Jefferson's education
In 1752, Jefferson began attending a local school run by a Scottish Presbyterian minister. At the age of nine, Jefferson began studying Latin, Greek, and French; he learned to ride horses, and began to appreciate the study of nature. He studied under the Reverend James Maury from 1758 to 1760 near Gordonsville, Virginia. While boarding with Maury's family, he studied history, science and the classics.
In 1760, Jefferson entered The College of William & Mary in Williamsburg at the age of 16; he studied there for two years. At William & Mary, he enrolled in the philosophy school and studied mathematics, metaphysics, and philosophy under Professor William Small, who introduced Jefferson to the writings of the British Empiricists, including John Locke, Francis Bacon, and Isaac Newton. He also perfected his French, carried his Greek grammar book wherever he went, practiced the violin, and read Tacitus and Homer. Jefferson displayed an avid curiosity in all fields and, according to the family tradition, frequently studied fifteen hours a day.Randolph, Sarah N., The Domestic Life of Thomas Jefferson (Cambridge, MA: University Press, 1939), p15.] His closest college friend, John Page of Rosewell, reported that Jefferson "could tear himself away from his dearest friends to fly to his studies."
While in college, Jefferson was a member of a secret organization called the Flat Hat Club, now the namesake of the William & Mary student newspaper. He lodged and boarded at the College in the building known today as the Sir Christopher Wren Building, attending communal meals in the Great Hall, and morning and evening prayers in the Wren Chapel. Jefferson often attended the lavish parties of royal governor Francis Fauquier, where he played his violin and developed an early love for wines.John Hailman, "Thomas Jefferson on Wine" , New York Times, 3 December 2006 After graduation, he studied law with George Wythe and was admitted to the Virginia bar in 1767.
Libraries Throughout his life, Jefferson depended on books for his education. He collected and accumulated thousands of books for his library at Monticello. A significant portion of Jefferson's library was also bequeathed to him in the will of George Wythe, who had an extensive collection. Always eager for more knowledge, Jefferson continued learning throughout most of his life. Jefferson once said, "I cannot live without books."
By 1815, Jefferson's library included 6,487 books, which he sold to the Library of Congress for $23,950 to replace the smaller collection destroyed in the War of 1812. He intended to pay off some of his large debt, but immediately started buying more books.Leonard Liggio, "The Life and Works of Thomas Jefferson" , The Locke Luminary Vol. II, No. 1 (Summer 1999) Part 3, George Mason University, accessed 10 January 2012 In honor of Jefferson's contribution, the library's website for federal legislative information was named THOMAS. In 2007, Jefferson's two-volume 1764 edition of the Qur'an was used by Rep. Keith Ellison for his swearing into the House of Representatives. In February 2011 the New York Times reported that a part of Jefferson's retirement library, containing 74 volumes with 28 book titles, was discovered at Washington University in St. Louis.
Notes on the State of Virginia
In 1780 Jefferson as governor received numerous questions about Virginia, posed to him by François Barbé-Marbois, then Secretary of the French delegation in Philadelphia, the temporary capital of the united colonies, who intended to gather pertinent data on the American colonies. Jefferson's responses to Marbois' "Queries" would become known as Notes on the State of Virginia (1785). Scientifically trained, Jefferson was a member of the American Philosophical Society, which had been founded in Philadelphia in 1743. He had extensive knowledge of western lands from Virginia to Illinois. In a course of 5 years, Jefferson enthusiastically devoted his intellectual energy to the book; he included a discussion of contemporary scientific knowledge, and Virginia's history, politics, and ethnography. Jefferson was aided by Thomas Walker, George R. Clark, and U.S. geographer Thomas Hutchins. The book was first published in France in 1785 and in England in 1787.Shuffelton (1999, June 2001), Notes on the State of Virginia Thomas Jefferson, Introduction
It has been ranked as the most important American book published before 1800. The book is Jefferson's vigorous and often eloquent argument about the nature of the good society, which he believed was incarnated by Virginia. In it he expressed his beliefs in the separation of church and state, constitutional government, checks and balances, and individual liberty. He also compiled extensive data about the state's natural resources and economy.
Presidency
Military academy at West Point
Ideas for a national institution for military education were circulated during the American Revolution. It wasn't until 1802 when Jefferson, following the advice of George Washington, John Adams and others, finally convinced Congress to authorize the funding and building of the United States Military Academy at West Point on the Hudson River in New York. On March 16, 1802, Jefferson signed the Military Peace Establishment Act, directing that a corps of engineers be established and "stationed at West Point in the state of New York, and shall constitute a Military Academy." The Act would provide well-trained officers for a professional army. The officers would be reliable republicans rather than a closed elite as in Europe, for the cadets were to be appointed by Congressmen, and thus exactly reflect the nation's politics. In May 1801 Secretary of War Henry Dearborn announced that the president had "decided in favor of the immediate establishment of a military school at West Point and also on the appointment of Major Jonathan Williams", grandnephew of Benjamin Franklin, to direct "the necessary arrangements, at that place for the commencement of the school." On July 4, 1802, the US Military Academy at West Point formally commenced its role as an institution for scientific and military learning.
Later years
Plan for systematic education In 1785, Jefferson proposed a system of public schools for the Commonwealth of Virginia in the interest of "diffus[ing] knowledge more generally through the mass of the people". According to Jefferson, "The ultimate result of the whole scheme of education would be the teaching all the children of the state reading, writing, and common arithmetic: turning out [several] annually of superior genius, well taught in Greek, Latin, geography, and the higher branches of arithmetic: turning out...others annually, of still superior parts, who, to those branches of learning, shall have added such of the sciences as their genius shall have led them to." As a byproduct, this plan would furnish "to the wealthier part of the people convenient schools, at which their children may be educated, at their own expense."
The plan was for education of children in three successive stages corresponding with three types of schools: primary schools, which all children, regardless of their parents' financial ability, would be able to attend for at least three years; intermediate schools, for students who excelled in primary school, as well as for children whose parents were willing and able to pay for it; and the university, for students whose parents were willing to pay.Thomas Jefferson to A. Coray, 1823. ME 15:487
Stage I: primary school (ages 6–8) Jefferson proposed creating several five- to six-square-mile-sized school districts, called "wards"Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 1813. ME 13:399 or "hundreds", throughout Virginia, where "the great mass of the people will receive their instruction". Each district would have a primary school and a tutor who is supported by a tax on the people of the district. Every family in the district would be entitled to send their children to the school for three years, free of charge.Thomas Jefferson to M. Correa de Serra, 1817. ME 15:156 A family could continue sending a child after three years, but the family would have to pay for it.
These schools would teach "reading, writing, and arithmetic"; the "general notions of geography";Thomas Jefferson to M. Correa de Serra, 1817. ME 15:155 as well as Greek, Roman, European and American history. It was important that all children learn history because "apprising them of the past will enable them to judge of the future." According to Jefferson, "the principal foundations of future order will be laid here" and "the first elements of morality too may be instilled into [the children's] minds".
Jefferson opposed providing children in these schools religious texts, since he believed the children would be "at an age when their judgments are not sufficiently matured for religious enquiries". However, he was in favor of showing the children that happiness "does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed them, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just pursuits."
Stage II: intermediate school (ages 9–16) Each year, an official would visit the Fayoy school and choose one boy — a boy whose parents were too poor to provide their child further education — to continue on for at least one or two (and possibly up to eight) years at one of the Commonwealth's twenty grammar schools. Other parents willing and able to pay for it could send their children as well.
In the grammar schools, children would learn Greek and Latin; advanced geography; the higher branches of numerical arithmetic; geometry; and the elementary principles of navigation.