This publication presents a collection of articles about education drawn from magazines, journals, books, and reports. The collection includes 13 selections touching on key educational issues, challenging ideas, and proposals for change: (1) "First Born, Fast Grown: The Manful Life of Nicholas" (Isabel Wilkerson); (2) "Putting Children First" (William A. Galston); (3) "The Other Crisis in American Education" (Daniel J. Singal) about complacently maintaining that the top students are doing just fine; (4) "Do Private Schools Outperform Public Schools?" (Albert Shanker and Bella Rosenberg); (5) "Raising Standards for American Education" (National Council on Education Standards and Testing); (6) "Reach High" (John E. Jacob) about substantive goals for every African-American youth; (7) "Reading: Seeing the Big Picture" (John T. Bruer); (8) "Higher-Order Thinking Skills for Disadvantaged Students" (U.S. Department of Education's National Assessment of the Chapter 1 Program); (9) "America's Children and Their Elementary Schools" (David K. Cohen and S. G. Grant); (10) "Restructuring Teacher Compensation Systems" (Allan R. Odden and Sharon Conley); (11) "It Takes Two To Tango" (Patrick Welsh) about the fact that policy reforms will make no difference unless students are willing and motivated to work hard; (12) "A Prescription for World-Class Schools" (John A. Murphy); and (13) "What Should Unions Do?" (John Hoerr). (LL)