This year's Brown Center Report contains studies taking a long view. Part I examines national test data going back to 1971 from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The study in Part II compares the 1989 test scores of more than 1,000 schools to the same schools' scores in 2009. Part III compares the test scores of conversion charter schools from 1986, when they operated as traditional public schools, to those from 2008, when they operated as charter schools. The studies tackle perennial questions that, as often happens in education, manifest themselves as controversial topics on the contemporary scene: how to interpret trends in test scores, the distribution of achievement, school turnarounds, and charter schools. (Contains 11 tables, 2 figures and 29 notes.) [For "The 2008 Brown Center Report on American Education: How Well Are American Students Learning? Volume II, Number 3," see ED506869.]