Think Tank Inks Blueprint To Lift Achievement

By Kathleen Kennedy Manzo

Washington

The nation's public schools can dramatically raise academic achievement among struggling students over the next two decades with a coordinated strategy that puts greater emphasis on accountability, urban schools, and early-childhood education, argues a report released here last week.

The report by the Consortium on Renewing Education, an education think tank based at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., suggests that a comprehensive reform effort that includes school-based control, stronger teaching and leadership, and more interstate collaboration on reform initiatives could significantly improve achievement.

The panel of scholars, educators, policymakers, and business leaders that wrote the report contends that such progress can be made with little added...