Adler School Timeline
1870
Alfred Adler is born on February 7 in Penzing, Austria.
1895
Alfred Adler receives medical degree from the University of Vienna Medical School.
1898
Alfred Adler establishes a practice in Vienna.
1898
Alfred Adler publishes Health Book for the Tailor Trade, linking medical problems of tailors with poor living and working conditions; lays foundation for the study of mental health social determinants.
1902
Sigmund Freud invites Alfred Adler to join the Wednesday Psychological Society (later called the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society).
1911
Alfred Adler and Freud part ways, and Adler is expelled from the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society.
1914
World War I begins after the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
1916
Alfred Adler is drafted as a military physician for the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
1917
The Russian Revolution begins.
1917
The United States enters World War I.
1918
The Armistice is declared, ending World War I.
1918
Alfred Adler is discharged from military service and begins to emphasize social interest and community issues in his writing.
1920
Alfred Adler meets medical student Rudolf Dreikurs and invites him on a client visit.
1920
The Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States is ratified, which prohibits gender-based restrictions on voting.
1921
Alfred Adler establishes the first Child Guidance Clinic in Vienna, and he lectures at Vienna’s Pedagogical Institute.
1922
Alfred Adler develops the open forum model of counseling—involving parents and children in public counseling demonstrations—to make psychological intervention and psychotherapy accessible to the general public.
1923
Rudolf Dreikurs begins working within Adler’s Child Guidance Clinics.
1926
Alfred Adler first travels to the United States.
1929
The New York Stock Market crashes, beginning the Great Depression in the United States.
1930
Economic depression reaches Europe. Mahatma Gandhi leads the Salt March to Dandi, beginning the civil disobedience movement and the road to independence for India.
1933
Adolf Hitler is sworn in as Chancellor of Germany and suspends basic civil rights.
1933
Alfred Adler publishes Social Interest: A Challenge to Mankind. Social interest is articulated as a construct to explain people, to guide work with people, and to describe our responsibility to each other within our communities.
1937
Alfred Adler dies on May 28 while on a lecture tour in Aberdeen, Scotland. Rudolf Dreikurs finishes the tour.
1937
Rudolf Dreikurs immigrates to Chicago and founds the Individual Psychology Society of Chicago.
1938
The Fair Labor Standards Act is enacted, legislating the eight-hour workday and limiting the abuse of children through many forms of child labor.
1938
Rudolf Dreikurs opens the first Child Guidance Center on the South Side of Chicago—the Abraham Lincoln Center—using the open forum counseling model and offering parenting education and training to the community.
1939
Germany invades Poland, precipitating World War II.
1941
Japan attacks Pearl Harbor. The United States and the Soviet Union enter World War II.
1941
Rudolf Dreikurs establishes the second Chicago Guidance Center at the Jane Addams Hull House Mary Crane Nursery. Dreikurs and his family are residents at Hull House.
1945
The United States drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. World War II ends. United Nations is established.
1948
United Nations General Assembly adopts the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to promote human, civil, economic, and social rights as the foundation of freedom, justice, and peace in the world.
1952
Rudolf Dreikurs and the Individual Psychology Association of Chicago found the Alfred Adler Institute of Chicago, renamed the Adler School of Professional Psychology in 1991).
1952
Rudolf Dreikurs establishes a Child Guidance Center in the Lake View neighborhood of Chicago.
1954
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka paves the way for school integration and the civil rights movement.
1956
The Alfred Adler Institute of Chicago develops a research program with the University of Chicago Counseling Center to study the effectiveness of time-limited therapy.
1961
The Alfred Adler Institute faculty join with the University of Chicago in co-sponsoring a Psychology of Women course of study designed and taught by the Institute.
1961
United States troop levels and involvement in Vietnam escalates.
1961
Rudolf Dreikurs publishes Social Equality: The Challenge of Our Times through the Alfred Adler Institute. Later, in 1971, it is revised and republished as Social Equality: Challenge of Today.
1963
The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom is organized. In 1964, The Civil Rights Act is passed, illegalizing discrimination based on race, religion, gender, national origin, and other characteristics.
1964
The Alfred Adler Institute creates a group therapy program for incarcerated people at Cook County Jail, the precursor to a later focus on the incarcerated and the formerly incarcerated.
1966
Martin Luther King, Jr. leads a march of about 700 through Marquette Park in Chicago to protest housing segregation.
1967
The Alfred Adler Institute begins the Teacher Development Center with a school in Rockford, Illinois, preparing teachers to use Adlerian theory and principles. The initiative is the precursor for many similar programs.
1968
The first Psy.D. (Doctor of Psychology) program begins at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
1969
Armstrong and Aldrin are the first humans to walk on the moon.
1969
The Stonewall Riots occur in New York City, marking the start of the gay rights movement. In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association declares that homosexuality is not a mental disorder.
1970
The Environmental Protection Agency is established, and the first Earth Day is observed on April 22.
1972
The Dreikurs Psychological Services Center, the precursor of Adler Community Health Services, is established as a community mental health center and as a training site for the Alfred Adler Institute.
1973
The Vail Conference establishes the scholar-practitioner model of training for professional psychology within the American Psychological Association.
1974
The Institute’s first student group, the Adler Student Association, is established.
1974
The Art Therapy Program is begun by Sadie “Tee” Dreikurs, a student of Jane Addams and an art therapist at St. Joseph Hospital in Chicago.
1974
The Family Learning Program is launched and offers public counseling demonstrations.
1974
The Alfred Adler Institute establishes procedures to work with other institutes and organizations to formalize distributed/distance education and training in counseling psychology and school counseling.
1975
The Alfred Adler Institute begins granting a Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology.
1977
The Institute moves from 110 South Dearborn Street to larger quarters at 159 North Dearborn Street.
1977
The first commercially available complete personal computer is introduced.
1979
The first commencement exercises for graduates of the Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology program is held on October 8.
1983
Harold Lee Washington is elected first African-American mayor of Chicago.
1985
Enrollment increases support the Institute’s move to 618 South Michigan Avenue.
1986
New programs are offered in Family and Marital Counseling and Substance Abuse Counseling.
1987
The Doctor of Psychology (Psy.D.) Program begins with an entering class of 24 students.
1990
Nelson Mandela is released from prison in South Africa. In 1994, he is elected President and supports reconciliation and transition toward multiracial democracy in South Africa.
1990
The World Wide Web is proposed and released.
1990
The Americans with Disabilities Act is enacted, mirroring protections afforded by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to those with certain disabilities.
1991
The Alfred Adler Institute of Chicago is renamed the Adler School of Professional Psychology. The School motto is reaffirmed as Non nobis solus sed omnibus (Not for ourselves alone but for all).
1991
The Adler School moves to new quarters at 65 East Wacker Place, more than doubling the size of the campus.
1998
The Master of Arts in Counseling and Organizational Psychology is launched.
2002
The Adler School celebrates its 50th anniversary.
2004
The Board of Trustees refines the Vision of the Adler School, based on its Adlerian heritage, to focus on socially responsible practice and social justice.
2005
The Master of Arts in Police Psychology is launched, the first of its kind in graduate education.
2005
The first Adler Institute for Social Change, the Institute on Social Exclusion, is established.
2005
The Adler School begins operation of a Vancouver Campus. Since 1978, the School had offered education and training in Vancouver through an agreement with the Adlerian Psychology Association of British Columbia.
2006
The Adler School revises curricula for all degree programs, following a community-based needs assessment, to produce socially responsible practitioners. The first Community Service Practicum is implemented, the first of its kind in graduate psychology training.
2007
The Adler School Alumni Association is established.
2009
The second Adler Institute for Social Change, the Institute on Public Safety and Social Justice, is established.
2009
Masters programs in Rehabilitation Psychology and Gerontological Psychology are launched.
2010
Following a three-year community-wide planning process, a new campus is established at 17 North Dearborn Street.
2010
Programs in Sport and Health Psychology and Forensic Psychology are initiated.