This paper describes the recent policy history of reading education, its place on the public policy agenda, and the research that relates reading policy to reading instruction. Part I of the paper provides a brief recent history of federal education policy, which aims to ensure equity. Part II revisits compensatory education and describes systemic reform, the theoretical underpinning of current state education policy. It also reviews effects of the so-called second wave of policy that deals with the harder issues of implementation and capacity building. Part III emphasizes the research on implementation in Michigan--it reviews the relation between school restructuring and reading instruction and describes research on the non-monolithic character of policy responses by teachers and administrators. Part IV discusses the demise of constructivist reading policy in California. Part V suggests an agenda-setting process that culminated with current federal reading policy initiatives. (Contains 73 references.) (RS)