The schools in some major cities in the US are graduating as few as 30% of students who enroll. This is clearly a disaster–not in the making-but one that’s already here. I hear that planners can project the size of the future prison population by how the poorly the students are  performing. There is endless discussion and tons of programs to aid schools yet the problems persist. A few schools do a great job but the effort required is herculean –wearing and burning teachers out quickly. Jamaican Beverly Hall has done a remarkable job as head of the Atlanta public schools which have shown progress for the past eight years she has been there. So there is hope that things can be turned around. Atlanta was once a low performing school system until Beverly showed up. But why is it so hard?