Published: November 19, 2008 11:51 am         

Schools celebrate Education Week

The 87th annual American Education Week is Nov. 16-22 and area schools are celebrating each school day this week with an activity or a special day.

On Tuesday, Chalmers Elementary School celebrated the week by inviting parents and grandparents to join their children for lunch at school.

The National Education Association helped to create the American Education Week after realizing that 25 percent of World War I draftees could not read and write and nine percent were physically unfit. In 1919 the NEA and the American Legion met to brainstorm how to influence public support for education.

In 1921, the NEA called for “an educational week...observed in all communities annually for the purpose of informing the public of the accomplishments and needs of the public schools and to secure the cooperation and support of the public in meeting those needs.

According to the NEA website, “the first observance of American Education Week occurred Dec. 4-10, 1921, with the NEA and American Legion as the cosponsors. A year later, the then U.S. Office of Education joined the effort as a cosponsor, and the PTA followed in 1938.”

The annual tagline for American Education week is “Great Public Schools: A Basic Right and Our Responsibility.”