The catalyst for the serious reform movements during the 1980s was the Reagan administration's National Commission on Excellence in Education (NCEE), a bipartisan group of business, political, and education leaders who addressed what they referred to as a "rising tide of mediocrity." Their report, A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform, published in May 1983, called for reform which would address the twin goals of equity and high-quality schooling. Commission members insisted that both goals have profound and practical meaning for society and the economy; that the United States could not permit one to yield to the other in principle or in practice. It was imperative, they said, that our educational system develop the talents of all students to the fullest extent. This commission was particularly distressed that the number of students taking the general (nonacademic...