ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the numerous federal, state, and local initiatives that have been developed to reform public education. It discusses the obstacles to reform that remain as the United States seeks to develop an educational system that respond to the challenges of the 21st century. The chapter describes the problems associated with public education in contemporary America, especially since the highly critical study A Nation At Risk was published in the 1980s. The cornerstone of education reform from the federal to the state to the local level is standardized testing as a key to determining proficiency of learning and accountability of teaching. Critics of this approach say that so-called high stakes testing is deeply flawed in terms of preparation time, teaching to the test, testing tied to graduation, and erratic funding to assist students who have difficulty passing the test.
