In the final sprint to polish Race to the Top applications, hundreds of school districts shunned a shot at a share of $4 billion in grants by refusing to sign on to their states' plans for the federal competition. California officials had secured the signatures of 790 local education agencies (leas) late last week, including most of the state's…

Private foundations can play a critical, catalytic role in changing American public education for the better, but they could and should be getting more bang for their bucks than they are right now. This article reports on a diverse collection of research papers that aims to shed unprecedented light both on the scope of contemporary education…