So, the announcement of the round one Race to the Top finalists is upon us. In the run-up, a pernicious parlor game in edu-policy circles has been “name the RTT finalists.” Thankfully, it’s about to come to a close. Unfortunately, it’ll be followed by “name the RTT winners.”

Even though they still haven’t seen the light of day in draft form, much less been joined by any assessments, the evolving “common core” standards project of the National Governors Association (NGA) and Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) is already being laden with heavier and heavier burdens. This is enormously risky and, frankly, hubristic, since nobody yet has any idea whether these standards will be solid, whether the tests supposed to be aligned with them will be up to the challenge, or whether the “passing scores” on those tests will be high or low, much less how this entire apparatus will be sustained over the long haul.

A story last week in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that fully 191 schools in the state of Georgia, 10 percent of the total number of elementary and middle schools, are up for investigation for altering test answer sheets. The next day's story put the count at one in five Georgia public schools.

There is no end to the debate over intelligence. The latest book-length entry into this debate is University of Michigan psychology professor Richard Nisbett’s "Intelligence and How to Get It: Why Schools and Cultures Count."

This self­-described “celebration” of the Montgomery County Public Schools, a 140,000-­student behemoth in the Washington, D.C., suburbs, is no doubt meant to add the district to the list of superstar systems worthy of national attention.

Research can change the political agenda…if the circumstances are right

A new NYU study finds that schools assigned new elementary and secondary principals trained by the Aspiring Principals Program of the New York City Leadership Academy outperformed other city schools with new principals who came through traditional routes in English Language Arts, and matched their performance in math.

For years, our public schools have paid as little attention to personnel costs as General Motors has.

Why aren’t schools an issue in the 2008 election?