Binding the Pieces Together

Boston

When Ellen Guiney arrived in Washington in 1992 as the Senate aide overseeing the overhaul of federal K-12 programs, she discovered that the nation's high-poverty schools received money from a patchwork of federal programs, each addressing specific needs of students and none aiming to improve everything the school does.

She spent two years--along with a cadre of U.S. Department of Education officials, legislative aides, and lobbyists--cajoling and persuading interest groups into letting principals in high-poverty schools combine the numerous accounts to create one plan that addresses all the...