History
The training school movement began in 1911. The southern training schools were supported by northern philanthropists, roughly from 1910 to 1930. [1] [2] The Slater Fund supported many of the schools. [3] [4] Philanthropic organizations had their own criteria for funding support. [5]
In the segregated Jim Crow South (roughly until the 1950s), schools for African Americans could not be high schools so they were called training schools and “emphasized vocational training and domestic science over academic subjects”. [6] In the south they often served African American students from a large area and were often named county training schools. County training schools were established in Alabama starting in 1915. [7] Training schools addressed the need for larger and better schools to supplement elementary education in small rural schools and helped meet the demand for teachers. They had an agricultural and industrial training ethos and required support and cooperation from local officials. Many schools were eventually renamed, and became high schools until desegregation when many were closed.
Training schools were also established in northern states and in Canada as educational reformatory schools.