Published: May 1, 2000

On The Record

Retro Rating

In May, after 58 years of chronicling the American experience, Life magazine will publish its last monthly issue. Famous for its intimate photographs of people at school, work, play, and war, the magazine also made attempts to engage its readers in civic life. In its October 1950 issue, for example, Life published a test to help parents gauge the quality of their children's schools. "Some schools are good, and some schools are bad, and it is next to impossible for most citizens to tell which are which," the editors intoned. "They can look at the teachers and buildings and form impressions. But unless the average parent has wide academic experience, there is no sure-fire way for him to judge for himself the job a school is doing or to measure it against any other school." Life claimed that by responding "yes" or "no" to its 63 test statements-with "yes" answers denoting positive

attributes-parents could measure just how good their kids' schools were. Below are...