“In 1870, few college students had attended high schools, and the two institutions were rivals more than complements of one another. But in 1910 four years of high school had become the standard prerequisite for higher education. This momentous transformation is the subject of VanOverbeke’s lucid and thorough study. He has admirably captured the interplay of the ideas and aspirations for articulating these two institutions against the hard realities of schools and colleges during a generation of breathtaking change.”—Roger Geiger, Distinguished Professor of Education, Pennsylvania State University

“In this imaginative and groundbreaking study, VanOverbeke demonstrates how national systems of secondary and collegiate education were formed in tandem during the latter nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Starting with the efforts of a few visionary university leaders, it was a process that led eventually to the formation of the College Board, with assistance from the Carnegie Foundation. With scrupulous historical scholarship and an engaging narrative style, VanOverbeke describes the people and events that contributed to this outcome, one that was neither preordained nor inevitable. It is a fine contribution to the historical literature on both secondary and collegiate education during this period.”—John L Rury, Professor of Education and History, University of Kansas