In the years since Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954), there have been many well-intentioned but unsuccessful efforts to close America’s racial and ethnic gaps in academic achievement

At the time of Brown, 75% to 85% of the nation’s black students (and 75% of Latinos) scored below the median for whites on standardized academic tests. That has been the case ever since. Despite extensive government intervention and numerous educational reforms, the disparities remain. This persistent achievement gap has become one of the most comprehensively documented facts in American educational history.