Richard Whitmire

In late March a panel of ten education experts gathered in Washington to nominate four most-improved urban school districts for a national education prize. What should have been a routine review of student data, however, suddenly took a new direction.

First one member on the review panel for the annual...

Unfortunately, this nation lacks a large pool of big-city school chiefs who are truly successful at their jobs. The only upside: the small pool of winners can be easily categorized.

For instance, there's the slow-and-steady type. Chris Steinhauser, who runs the schools in Long Beach, Calif., comes...

At first glance, it would appear there is little to cheer about with America's urban schools. Results from the "Nation's Report card," released Nov. 1 by the U.S. Education Department, were disappointing: no true narrowing of the black/white achievement gaps. High school graduation rates are shockingly low, especially...

Experts who study urban schools districts that are severely challenged by problems of poverty and non-English-speaking students agree that these districts sort out into roughly four groupings. Let's call them pre-basic, basic, intermediate and advanced.

The good news for Dallas is that it has escaped the lowest category, pre-basic....

This week Oregon announced that 6,800 high school seniors were at risk of being denied diplomas because they were unable to pass the state reading test. Here's a fact that wasn't included in the news: 3,900 of those students are males, 2,900 females.

An oddity? Not likely, given that boys...

Something extraordinary played out recently after D.C. schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson announced she was firing roughly 200 teachers for poor performance. Nothing... mostly silence.

In this situation, silence truly is extraordinary. When Michelle Rhee was chancellor of D.C. schools, her teacher firings triggered street demonstrations organized by multiple...

Less than a year ago, as I was finishing a book on Michelle Rhee, the combative former chancellor of schools in Washington, D.C., the time arrived to set up a website for the book. The website designer asked if I wanted to include reader comments. It was a sensible suggestion....

Granted, school reform is not a sporting event, but generals and politicians routinely twin sports and public policy. In that spirit, I offer this suggestion: With last week's greatly downgraded assessment of "cheating" in Washington, D.C. schools, we need a referee to call a strike count on the campaign to...

One of the nation's most compelling education experiments -- a $100 million-plus infusion aimed both at saving Newark school children and building a national school reform model -- appears at risk of early derailment.

Six months ago, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a $100 million donation to help turn around...

Based on recent headlines, this would appear to be a glorious year for education reform. After years of wheel-spinning debates, governors in states such as Florida, Connecticut, Indiana and Ohio are blazing fast tracks trying to turn around troubled school districts.

To ensure the best new teachers are those who...

In a time of multiple wars around the globe and a nuclear meltdown in Japan, you wouldn't expect to see so many front page stories about education policy fights -- but you do. In Florida, Idaho, Minnesota, New York... almost everywhere.

What's happening? And why does former Washington D.C. schools...

The recent announcement by Washington Mayor Vincent Gray that he will keep Kaya Henderson as schools chancellor, after her interim tour, would at first glance suggest that he is sticking with Michelle Rhee's controversial school reforms.

After all, Henderson was Rhee's deputy chancellor, and the two women are good friends....

School reformers like to talk, so they conference a lot. They like writing even more, so they dash off torrents of commentaries on improving schools.

But in all that talking and writing there is one topic that rarely gets raised, especially among white school reformers: race. Just too uncomfortable.

That...

The national debate on whether teacher layoffs should be done by seniority now focuses on New York City, where on Sunday the Department of Education released a worst-case list of layoffs -- with the last hired at the top of the lists.

With the state senate set to vote on...

Does achieving aggressive school reform require vilifying the teachers unions?

No, answered Education Secretary Arne Duncan at a Denver conference earlier this month, urging instead "tough minded collaboration." Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, by contrast, opts for the vilify path, saying unions are mired in "19th Century thinking." In...

Many of you have seen Michelle Rhee scowling on the cover of Time wielding a broom. Perhaps you saw her snapping at teachers' union president Randi Weingarten after a preview showing of "Waiting for Superman." Maybe you remember Oprah declaring Rhee a "woman warrior."

All that makes Rhee sound very...

There were cheers all around last week from school reform opponents when "Waiting for Superman" failed to make the Oscar-nominee short list. Hard to say which was headier news to them: the Oscars snub or Schools Chancellor (and "Superman" star) Michelle Rhee getting bounced from Washington, D.C.

Justice was served,...