High-ability and gifted students are well-served by a focus on the development of community. The Academic Year Governor's Schools of Virginia were created with a formalized emphasis on the network of relationships built among the students, faculty, and the larger community. The power of these communities of learners was evident in a study of the…

Bob Cornett, a former state budget director for Kentucky, describes himself as a "retired bureaucrat." But as a parent, grandparent, and a person who has been involved in education reform for more than 20 years, he's come to understand that, if public education policies are to be corrected, the impetus has to come from the citizenry. In…