From the halls of Congress to the local elementary school, conversations on education reform have tossed around the term "achievement gap" as though people all know precisely what that means. As it's commonly used, "achievement gap" refers to the differences in scores on state or national achievement tests between various…

Rose and Gallup report on the results of the 38th Annual PDK/Gallup Poll of the Public's Attitude Toward the Public Schools. This year's survey examined No Child Left Behind and the public's perception of the law, the appropriate role of standardized testing, the achievement gap between white students and black and Hispanic students, the…

Half a century after Brown v. Board of Education, the great progress made in education can be marked, but the gap remains. Some federal and state political leaders have made gung-ho proclamations about leaving no child behind. Yet they send in too few troops, too lightly supported, and with too little planning. The vaunted "historic…