James, Thomas (tj2180)

Thomas James

Professor of History and Education
Program Director, History and Education
212-678-7402

Office Location:

HM 334E HMann

Office Hours:

Mondays 2:00-3:30 p.m. or by appointment (scheduled via an email). 

Educational Background

B.A., Harvard University;
M.A., Ph.D., Stanford University

Scholarly Interests

History of education; public policy and education; experiential learning

“Kurt Hahn Award,” given by the Trustees of Outward Bound “For a life of service and compassion embodying the true spirit of Outward Bound and especially for those qualities so highly valued by Hahn:  an enterprising curiosity, an undefeatable spirit, tenacity in pursuit, readiness for sensible self-denial, and, above all, compassion.”


Louis Knott Koontz Award from the American Historical Association for the most distinguished scholarly article published in one of the association's major journals, the Pacific Historical Review.  The article was "The Education of Japanese Americans at Tule Lake, 1942‑1946".


Exile Within: The Schooling of Japanese Americans received the annual award from the Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Human Rights in the United States for the "best scholarship on the subject of intolerance in the United States."


Distinguished Service Award for Learned Article, Educational Press Association of America, All‑America Awards Program, for "Moral Majorities and the School Curriculum: Historical Perspectives on the Legalization of Virtue," co‑authored with David Tyack and published in the Teachers College Record.


Multiple grants from Spencer Foundation, Culpeper Foundation, and other private and public sources.


Adventurous Teachers, Excellent Schools (Stamford, CT: Charles C. Culpeper Foundation).  School-based faculty renewal practices and creative strategies for professional development.


Exile Within: The Schooling of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press).  An archival history of the Japanese American children of war while held in internment camps with their families during World War II.


Law and the Shaping of Public Education, 1785‑1954, with David B. Tyack and Aaron Benavot (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press).  The role of constitutions, law-making and legal disputes in the growth of mass education in the United States.


Comparing Public and Private Schools, with Henry M. Levin, 2 volumes (Philadelphia, PA and London: Falmer Press).  An exploration of the uses of social sciences and history in understanding the development and interaction of the public and private sectors in K-12 schooling.


Public Dollars for Private Schools: The Case of Tuition Tax Credits, with Henry M. Levin (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press).  Analysis of one proposed policy for channeling public revenues to the nonpublic sector of K-12 education in the United States.


Education at the Edge: The Colorado Outward Bound School (Denver, CO: Outward Bound).  The first history of an Outward Bound in North America, focusing on the development and educational ideas of this distinctive form of experiential education.


More than 50 published articles, essays and chapters on history, education, public policy.


History of Education Society

American Educational Research Association

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