Primary education in the United States typically refers to the first six years of formal education in most jurisdictions. Primary education may also be referred to as elementary education and most schools offering these programs are referred to as elementary schools. Preschool programs, which are less formal and usually not mandated by law, are generally not considered part of primary education. The first year of primary education is commonly referred to as kindergarten and begins at or around age 5. Subsequent years are usually numbered being referred to as first grade, second grade, and so forth. Students graduating from fifth grade, typically the last primary year, are normally age 11.
In 2001 there were 92,858 elementary schools (68,173 public, 24,685 private) in the United States, a figure which includes all schools that teach students from grades one through eight. According to the National Center for Education Statics, in the fall of 2009 almost 3.5 million students attended public primary schools. In addition, 1,085,000 children were projected to attend public preschool or prekindergarten in the fall of 2009.
Read more about Primary Education In The United States: Elementary School (Kindergarten Through Grade 4/5/6), Preschool, Teachers' Pay, National Science Standards
Famous quotes containing the words united states, primary, education, united and/or states:
“I do not look upon these United States as a finished product. We are still in the making.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1954)
“One of the effects of a safe and civilised life is an immense oversensitiveness which makes all the primary emotions somewhat disgusting. Generosity is as painful as meanness, gratitude as hateful as ingratitude.”
—George Orwell (1903–1950)
“Major [William] McKinley visited me. He is on a stumping tour.... I criticized the bloody-shirt course of the canvass. It seems to me to be bad “politics,” and of no use.... It is a stale issue. An increasing number of people are interested in good relations with the South.... Two ways are open to succeed in the South: 1. A division of the white voters. 2. Education of the ignorant. Bloody-shirt utterances prevent division.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“In the United States adherence to the values of the masculine mystique makes intimate, self-revealing, deep friendships between men unusual.”
—Myriam Miedzian, U.S. author. Boys Will Be Boys, introduction (1991)
“The admission of the States of Wyoming and Idaho to the Union are events full of interest and congratulation, not only to the people of those States now happily endowed with a full participation in our privileges and responsibilities, but to all our people. Another belt of States stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)