Report on 'Quiet Crisis' for Young Children Stirs Loud Response

By Deborah L. Cohen

Washington

A Carnegie Corporation of New York report sounding the alarm about a "quiet crisis'' facing the nation's youngest children evoked a loud and emotional outpouring of support from top government, business, health, and education officials at a meeting here last week.

Hillary Rodham Clinton, the first speaker, conceded that it will take uncommon "political will and institutional fortitude'' to fill the report's mandate. But there is reason for optimism, she said, simply because...