The story of Bank Street College of Education began in 1916, when visionary educator Lucy Sprague Mitchell, along with her husband Wesley Mitchell and colleague Harriet Johnson, founded the Bureau of Educational Experiments in New York City. Their revolutionary goal was to combine expanding psychological awareness with democratic conceptions of education, creating a learning environment that would study children to discover the environments best suited for their growth. This experimental approach laid the groundwork for what would become a leader in progressive education.
In 1930, the Bureau moved to 69 Bank Street in Greenwich Village, a location that would eventually give the institution its permanent name. By 1950, the Board of Regents of New York State certified the school to confer Master of Science degrees, and it was officially renamed Bank Street College of Education. Throughout the decades, the college expanded its reach, playing a pivotal role in the development of the national Head Start program in 1965 and moving to its current location on the Upper West Side in 1971. Today, Bank Street continues to be a pioneer in improving the education of children and their teachers by applying the principles of child development and social justice to the educational process.
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