ABSTRACT
A decade ago, in an analysis of Goals 2000, the sociologists contributing to Implementing Educational Reform: Sociological Perspectives on Educational Policy (Borman, Cookson, Sadovnik and Spade, 1996) argued that there were limits and possibilities to school-based educational reforms aimed at reducing educational inequalities based on social class, race, ethnicity, and gender. Ten years later, the sociologists contributing to this book make the same cautionary claim. Unfortunately, politicians in Washington and policymakers continue to ignore the powerful sociological dictum that schools do not operate in a vacuum and are affected by larger social, political, and economic forces.
