“Response to Intervention” aims to determine students’ weaknesses before they fall behind 

By Steven Yaccino, U.S. News & World Report, July 25, 2008 

When 8-year-old Hannah Hart started struggling in the classroom, her school wasted little time coming to her aid. Teachers and specialists provided extra daily tutoring in math and reading. About every six weeks, special educators, other classroom teachers, and even the principal of her school attended "data meetings" to examine Hannah's test scores, evaluate her progress, and pinpoint her specific needs. "Anything we did was in response to the data," says Ellen Barton, Hannah's second-grade teacher at Newmarket Elementary in Newmarket, N.H. That early attention paid off; the difference was like flipping a switch. "It was like going from the dark to the light," says Trish Hart, Hannah's mother. "Her confidence as a learner and a child just soared."

In students’ stories, no easy answer to education crisis 

By Sharon Noguchi, Mercury News, July 31, 2008 

Gavin Neves needed a job. A Broadway High School student felt threatened in class. Margarita Craig got pregnant.  

California high school students who drop out believe there's a good reason to leave school. Even in complicated circumstances, the trigger point can often be summed up in one word. Fear. Poverty. Boredom. Failure. Addiction.

After failing traditional learning, ‘Hip Hop High’ students fear their charter school will close 

By Mitchell Landsberg, Los Angeles Times, July 19, 2008 

HAWTHORNE, CALIF. — Students at "Hip-Hop High" know about adversity. For many, life has been a minefield of gangs, violence and family chaos. They were academic failures, many of them, kicked out of schools, allowed to fail their way from one grade to the next. 

New California Data Show Rate Worse for Latinos, Blacks 

By Dana Hull and Sharon Noguchi, Mercury News, July 17, 2008 

Nearly 1 in 4 of California's 6.3 million students drop out of school, according to new statistics released Wednesday by the California Department of Education.