Barritt, Loren

Professor in the University of Michigan School of Education.

Loren Barritt received a B.A. degree in English from Blackburn College in 1958. He received an M.A. degree in Guidance and Counseling in 1961 and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology in 1964 from Indiana University School of Education. At the University of Michigan School of Education Barritt served as an assistant professor from 1964 to 1968 and associate professor from 1968 to 1973. Since 1973 he has been a professor.

Barritt's research interests have evolved through the years. His dissertation in 1964 concerned the predictive validity of educational tests. In 1966 he joined the University of Michigan Center for Research on Language and Language Behavior. From 1966 to 1970 he conducted research on language testing for normal and retarded children.

European approaches to education and research held strong appeal for Barritt. In the first of four sabbatical leaves to study abroad, he spent the early months of 1970 as a visiting scholar at the Institute for the Scientific Study of Education at the University of Geneva, where he attended lectures by Jean Piaget. Barritt spent the 1973-74 academic year as a Senior Fulbright Lecturer at the University of Utrecht.

Back at the University of Michigan in 1974, Barritt established the Phenomenology Seminar, which in 1981 was renamed the Human Science Research Association meeting. The seminar brought together scholars interested in phenomenological approaches to educational research, which concentrates on a dialogue between study subjects and researchers and encourages participation in the lives of the subjects.

He returned to the Netherlands in 1978-79 with a Visitors Grant from the Netherlands Institute for Basic Research to write a monograph on "Researching Educational Practice," and in 1985-86 with a research grant from the Dutch Ministry of Education to study a Dutch elementary school.

Barritt served as the chair of the University of Michigan School of Education Program in Curriculum, Teaching and Psychological Studies from 1986 to 1990. In addition, he was involved with numerous university committees. Throughout his career, Barritt was an active member of many professional associations, including the American Educational Research Association, the National Council on Measurements in Education, the Human Science Research Association, and the American Anthropological Association.

From the description of Loren Barritt papers, 1964-2000. (University of Michigan). WorldCat record id: 84186740

Loren Barritt has enjoyed a long and productive career in education. He received a B.A. degree in English from Blackburn College in 1958. He received an M.A. degree in Guidance and Counseling in 1961 and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology in 1964 from Indiana University School of Education. At the University of Michigan School of Education Barritt served as an assistant professor from 1964 to 1968 and associate professor from 1968 to 1973. Since 1973, he has been a professor.

Barritt's research interests have evolved through the years. His dissertation in 1964 concerned the predictive validity of educational tests. In 1966 he joined the University of Michigan Center for Research on Language and Language Behavior. From 1966 to 1970 he conducted research on language testing for normal and retarded children.

European approaches to education and research held strong appeal for Barritt. In the first of four sabbatical leaves to study abroad, he spent the early months of 1970 as a visiting scholar at the Institute for the Scientific Study of Education at the University of Geneva, where he attended lectures by Jean Piaget. Barritt spent the 1973-74 academic year as a Senior Fulbright Lecturer at the University of Utrecht. Back at the University of Michigan in 1974, Barritt established the Phenomonology Seminar, which in 1981 was renamed the Human Science Research Association meeting. The seminar brought together scholars interested in phenomenological approaches to educational research, which concentrates on a dialogue between study subjects and researchers and encourages participation in the lives of the subjects. He returned to the Netherlands in 1978-79 with a Visitors Grant from the Netherlands Institute for Basic Research to write a monograph on "Researching Educational Practice," and in 1985-86 with a research grant from the Dutch Ministry of Education to study a Dutch elementary school.

Barritt served as the chair of the University of Michigan School of Education Program in Curriculum, Teaching and Psychological Studies from 1986 to 1990. In addition, he has served on numerous university committees. Throughout his career, Barritt has been an active member of many professional associations, including the American Educational Research Association, the National Council on Measurements in Education, and the Human Science Research Association, the North Dakota Study Group on Evaluation, and the American Anthropological Association.

From the guide to the Loren Barritt papers, 1963-2000, (Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan)

Loren S. and Marjorie Rabe Barritt were long-time homeowners in northeastern Ann Arbor, Michigan.

After moving to Traver Road on Ann Arbor's north side, Marjorie Barritt was involved in two neighborhood actions to preserve Black Pond woods from development. In 1968-1970, the Courtelis Corporation proposed a large apartment development for the Black Pond property; in 1980/81, Dahlmann Associates proposed a development of single family homes. Both efforts were successfully opposed by neighbors and citizens across the city. During a subsequent third attempt at development, citizens were successful in obtaining a grant that enabled the city to purchase the property.

Loren and Marjorie Barritt were neighbors of Eugene and Emily Leslie. When the Leslie's willed their homestead to the city, Marjorie Barritt was asked to become a member of the Leslie Homestead Master Planning Advisory Committee. She served on this committee during 1981 and 1982.

In 1989/90 a thirty-two acre tract of land lying between Newport West Condominium Association and Bird Hills Park was proposed for development. Citizens succeeded in raising money to initiate the city's purchase of the tract.

In August 1967, Loren and Marjorie Barritt purchased a lot on Lake Michigan on Good Harbor Bay, Cleveland Township, Leelanau County, Michigan eight miles from Sleeping Bear Dunes. Shortly after purchase of the property the Barritt's discovered that their lot was in the proposed Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, a national lakeshore first proposed by Senator Philip Hart in 1961. The proposed bill, which was resubmitted many times during the decade of the 1960s but which failed to gain enough congressional support for passage, included a cut-off date provision that provided "that any house or cottage on which construction was begun before December 31, 1964, may remain in private hands in perpetuity, . . ." (Letter from Philip Hart to Marjorie Barritt, September 10, 1968, in "Correspondence and Documents, 1967-1978).

The Barritts built a small cabin in 1969. The 1970 effort to establish Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore succeeded. As part of the first round of land acquisition in 1972, the Barritt's property was appraised and a purchase offer was made that included the possibility of a five-year retention of use period. After briefly exploring the possibility of fighting the government's purchase offer by hiring a condemnation lawyer, the Barritts, who were about to leave the country for a year's sabbatical, sold their property at the government's proposed price.

In the succeeding twenty-five years, the initial five-year retention period was extended, first to ten-years and then to twenty-five, as a result of owners' charges of unequal purchase and retention agreements and through the intervention of congress and/or court cases against the National Park Service. A chronology of these interventions and extensions are listed in a letter to Ron Eckert found in "Correspondence and documents, 1994."

In early 1994, Loren and Marjorie Barritt were contacted by a group of residents of Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore who were interested in seeking to extend or modify their lease arrangements from the National Park Service. A large number of leaseholders faced eviction in 1998, with most of the lease holders properties to be vacated by 2010, except for ninety properties that had never been purchased by the Park Service. The group that formed in 1994 as Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore Extended Occupancy Rights fought the impending evictions through the fall of 1998 by gathering information about leaseholders, by lobbying Congress individually and with the services of a paid lobbyist, and through publicity in newspapers.

The Barritts were among the large number of leaseholders whose leases expired in 1968. They vacated their cabin at the end of May 1998 and the cabin was bulldozed in August of that year.

From the guide to the Loren S. and Marjorie Rabe Barritt Collection, 1967-1998, (Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan)