Wikipedia:Today's featured article/April 12, 2010

Reflecting Pool and Cloister at The Avery Coonley School

The Avery Coonley School is an independent school serving academically gifted students in Downers Grove, Illinois, U.S. Avery Coonley was founded in 1906 to promote the progressive educational theories developed by John Dewey and other turn of the 20th century philosophers, and was a nationally recognized model for progressive education well into the 1940s. From 1943 to 1965, Avery Coonley was part of the National College of Education serving as a living laboratory for teacher training and educational research. It became a regional research center in the late 1960s and a school for the gifted in the early 1970s. The campus, designed in the Prairie and Arts and Crafts styles, was landscaped by Jens Jensen, who was known as "dean of the world's landscape architects." Avery Coonley was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2007, citing the "long-lasting influence on schools throughout the country" of the educational program and the design of the building and grounds. (more...)

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