McGraw Hill is an American educational publishing company and one of the "big three" educational publishers[2][3] that publishes educational content, software, and services for pre-K through postgraduate education. The company also publishes reference and trade publications for the medical, business, and engineering professions.
McGraw Hill operates in 28 countries, has about 4,000 employees globally, and offers products and services to about 140 countries in about 60 languages.[citation needed] Formerly a division of The McGraw Hill Companies (later renamed McGraw Hill Financial, now S&P Global), McGraw Hill Education was divested and acquired by Apollo Global Management in March 2013 for $2.4 billion in cash.[4][5][6][7][8] McGraw Hill was sold in 2021 to Platinum Equity for $4.5 billion.[9]
The company has increasingly emphasized adaptive learning products that assess the student's skill level and use this data to determine how to progress them through lessons for the subject matter. McGraw Hill now provides digital products and services to about 11 million users, with about 1,500 adaptive products in higher education and digital formats for its major K–12 programs.[citation needed]
McGraw Hill was founded in 1888 when James H. McGraw, co-founder of the company, purchased the American Journal of Railway Appliances. He continued to add further publications, eventually establishing The McGraw Publishing Company in 1899. His co-founder, John A. Hill, had also produced several technical and trade publications and in 1902 formed his own business, The Hill Publishing Company.[10]
In 1909, the two co-founders formed an alliance and combined the book departments of their publishing companies into an incorporated company called The McGraw-Hill Book Company.[11] John Hill served as president, with James McGraw as vice-president. The remaining parts of each business were merged into The McGraw-Hill Publishing Company, Inc in 1917.[12]
In 1946, McGraw-Hill founded an international division of the company.[13] It acquired Contemporary Films in 1972 and CRM in 1975. McGraw-Hill combined its films in the CRM division in 1978. McGraw-Hill sold CRM in 1987.[14]