Washington is at crossroads on K-12 education policy. It can continue down the path of top-down accountability; devolve power to states and districts, thereby returning to the status quo of the last century; or rethink the fundamentals and do something different. In "Choice and Federalism: Rethinking the Federal Role in Education," the Koret Task Force on K-12 Education proposes a new path in which Washington releases states from top-down accountability in exchange for unleashing the ability of parents to engage in informed choices of schools for their children and by causing those choices to generate competitive pressures on the providers of education services.