Timeline for CW in America

Massachusetts General Court asks Harvard to "ban its classical curriculum for more practical paths of study" (Adams 6).

Harvard begins electives for seniors only, influenced by the German model (Adams 6-7).

Harvard moves to elective system for junior through senior.

Harvard moves to an elective system from sophomores to seniors

Morrill Act

43 land grant schools opened from Morrill Act

Most American schools moved to institutional majors and degree programs.

Due to the detriment of the elective system, A.S. Hill begin English A, B, C, & D, a course for every year

Due to too much work for teachers and students, Harvard drops mandatorywriting classes to only freshman year with English A.

At this point, a more grammar-focused, less rhetorical, prescriptive approach to education took over, with books like Murray's _Gramma_ becoming a staple text. Grammar was common in 1819 and expanded in 1850.

English as a field of study consists of grammar rules and exercises, spelling, vocabulary, English literature, classical literature in translation, oral performance rhetorical and stylistic principles, and written composition.

Princeton conducts first English placement test.

First English placement test at Yale.

Most schools have an English placement test.

Hill notes that all the rule-focused writing courses are damaging students' writing.

Wendell stops teaching English A because he doesn't like the damage rules-based writing is causing student writing.

Due to a general dislike of the deleterious effects of too much rules-based writing, Scott writes _Paragraph Writing_.

Study by Asker argues no meaningful correlation between grammar tests and one's ability to write correct sentences or to write well.

Penny dailys begin, bringing info to the layperson, info not just meant for traditionally educated folks.

Yellow journalism begins aruond this time.

Hill teaches the first year-long advnaced, elective course, English 5. Hill used free- writing and workshop in carious genres in this class.

Wendell introduced English 12, one of Harvard's most popular courses because it was creative writing based and brought in the likes of DuBois, Frost, and Frank Norris. Most importantly, Wendell taught the regularity of habit for writers (Adams 47-48).

Though not CW based, English 18 was created to teach students argument, demonstrated in 15 page forensic essays.

English 22 was developed, where students, like Frank Norris, regularily worked on CW.

Robert Herrick, Wendell's old student, begins advanced comp at UofC, using Wendell's text and various genres of writing.

Bowdoin College did a team-taught creative writing course (Adams 56).

Mount Holyoke had various CW classes (Adams 57).

In the 1950s, those in comp wanted to nail down more specifically their field and gravitated to first-year writing, leaving their few electives in the hands of those inrhetoric, lit, and CW .

Playwriting starts at Michigan (Adams 1880).

Short story course first taught at Michagan (Adams 64).

Short story and poetry first taught at UofC (Adams 66).

Chicago School begins.

Several schools were teaching specific CW courses at this time. Consult notes on Adams for specifics (Adams 73).

_Short Story Writing_ was published (Adams).

George Cram (Jig) begins verse classes at Iowa (Adams86-87).

Short story at Newcomb College (Adams).

Short story at Iowa (Adams).

Ransom and the Outlaws (Adams 92).

Ransom and the outlaws publish The Fugitive (Adams 93).

Ransom teaches first CW course, English 9, at Vanderbilt (Adams 95).

45% of American colleges have at least one CW course in the curriculum.

English 12 Wendell, Gardier, Copeland Gates (Adams).

Practice in rheotrical arguemnt and forensic writing was replaced with linguistic and literary study

"Civilian work force in non-agracultural jobs qudruppled, with the highest rates in clerical and managerial positions" (Adams 15)

During this time, high schools' teaching of rhetoric, grammar, and mechanics drops drastically so that 70% of material was literature and "composition", though only1/5 of the composition work was alctually writing.

During this time, most tech schools cut their humanities requirements, resulting in engineering journals and those in the work force decring the need for better writing from college graduates.

Only seven eastern colleges had writing electives.

Lafayette creates a class in the short story (Adams 63).