I do not have enough starts to give this book. F*** Michelle Rhee; Diane Ravitch is the real deal. Extremely heartening for me as a public school teacher that someone out there is listening and paying attention. Ravitch offers a highly informative, multi-faceted look at school reform over the past 50 years or so to narrate how she came to her current views on what our focus should and shouldn't be when it comes to improving schools. In a shocking move in the current climate, she gives teachers the benefit of believing that most of them want to do good by their students and don't need to constantly be castigated in order to try their best. An insightful look at the myriad influences on children's success. It is only too bad that she didn't realize many of these things at the same time most (?) teachers did, i.e. at the inception of NCLB and choice programs. My only small criticism would be that all her "should"s at the end of the book are unfortunately pretty lofty, but to me a lot of what makes public education suffer right now would require a cultural overhaul to the general American psyche, which is a bit hard to come by. Thank you, Diane Ravitch, for making me feel less like I'm on crazy pills.