A look at national and particularly urban dropout rates reveals that the disadvantages of high school dropouts, relative to their graduate peers, are confounded by race, ethnicity, social class, and gender. Their troubles in terms of employment and earnings are more devastating today than they were 20 years ago. Quotes from Chester Finn present…

This paper addresses the demographic and socioeconomic effects on schools of the "new baby boom," consisting of school-age children of the original "baby boomers." The effects of this second-generation demographic trend include a higher proportion of minority students (since the decline in marriage and birth rates among baby…

Annual desk reference of key education facts is organized as follows: (1) year's education events in review; (2) common measures of education attainment; (3) cost of school construction; (4) demographics of school leadership; (5) gender gap in academic achievement; and (6) key education indicators by region and by state. (MLF)

This monograph (developed along with an accompanying slide presentation) is designed to stimulate the creative thinking of educational policymakers in response to the massive and rapid social upheavals occurring in the economy and at home--and consequently among the students themselves. After a brief introductory overview of these changes and…