Title I—A Success

By John F. Jennings

Imagine a national effort to improve the education of disadvantaged children that focuses extra funds on poorer schools, gives principals and teachers the authority to decide how best to help children, and encourages states to raise their academic standards and to hold accountable low-performing schools. Imagine, further, that school reformers view these funds as the "engine for reform" in the nation's most desolate schools.

This reform effort already exists in the form of a federal program known as Title I. Yet its fate hangs in the balance, as Congress debates whether to continue it and in what form. How can that be?

As the largest federal program of education aid, Title I provides approximately $8 billion annually to 45,000 schools in over 13,000 local school districts. Title I is the soul of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act,...