It is past time for us to organize around results for all students. We have had answers for decades and have ignored them. Schools continue to prepare our students for a past that no longer exists. We have ignored the research, and we have ignored the future our students will face when they leave school. We must shed the archaic, Industrial Age assumptions and structures that are preventing sustainable reforms.

We have titled this book Crimes Against Learning because students are held captive in school for thirteen years. They have little choice in setting the expectations adults have of them. They have little choice in the education opportunities they receive. Students are victims of a system that may not prepare them for a life of economic self-sufficiency. And, they have no means of escape.

Given the results, far too many students are being channeled into a life of poverty and disappointment. In the end, the vast majority of students are either victims or survivors of the schools they attend. Is it not a crime of negligence or even a crime of intent if we know what we can do to ensure that all students succeed, but we don’t act?