"Quality Counts 2012," the 16th edition of "Education Week"'s annual examination of issues and challenges facing America's public schools, takes aim at topics high on the policy agenda, from the White House and Congress down to the level of local school boards and chambers of commerce: the nation's international standing in…

In this article, the author discusses how England refines its accountability reforms. When the Conservative government crafted the Education Reform Act of 1988, which mandates a national curriculum for England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, as well as national-curriculum tests at ages 7, 11, and 14, schools in England were permitted to secede from…