This survey was designed to assess teachers' perspectives on student grade level preparedness. Specifically, it examines the kinds of problems that make it difficult to be a good student and how well prepared teachers feel they are to deal with these problems. As has been true since The MetLife Survey of the American Teacher began in 1984, more than 90 percent of all teachers in public schools continue to rate the overall quality of education in their own school as positive, with more than 40 percent rating it excellent. A sample of 1,000 teachers, designed to be representative of all teachers in the public schools in kindergarten through grade 12 throughout the United States, was surveyed by telephone between March 2 and March 12, 1992. Reported findings include: (1) Students are not fully prepared to learn at their grade level; (2) Lack of parental support is the most serious hindrance to students' ability to learn, followed in decreasing order by poverty, parental drug or alcohol problems, physical or psychological abuse, poor nutrition, student alcohol problems, school violence, problems with the English language, student drug problems and poor health; and (3) Less than one-third of teachers feel they have the necessary expertise to deal with the ten most-listed challenges to student learning.