Our New Education Special Report

By Walter Isaacson, Managing Editor

As they prepare for their first debates this week, one point on which George W. Bush and Al Gore agree is that education is the critical issue for this new century. We'll succeed as a nation in this information age only if our schools and students succeed. That's why we at TIME have expanded our coverage with a new Education Special Report that will appear early in each month of the school year--a commitment of 54 extra news pages. At the same time, we'll keep bringing you our regular weekly coverage of education, including news and enterprising features. But our new special section allows us the time and space to probe deeper. We want to look at ideas that work, classroom heroes who are making a difference and assumptions that need to be explored. And we've given that assignment to a team of journalists who are steeped in the culture of teaching.

This week's lead education story, for example, is written by Andrew Goldstein, who knows a bit about class cutups and brawlers from his days as a teacher and dean of students at a private school in New Jersey. Andrew's story examines an innovative Baltimore, Md., program that takes disruptive students out of the middle schools and sends them to a boarding school in Kenya, where many have turned their life around. The idea for this story came from deputy picture editor Hillary Raskin, who picked it up from photographer Radhika Chalasani, who had followed students to Kenya and back to Baltimore. Also contributing to the vibrant look of the new section are associate picture editor Eleanor Taylor (a former Peace Corps volunteer) and associate art director Daniel Guadalajara.

Rebecca Winters, whose mom is a district school superintendent and whose dad is back in college seeking his doctorate in education administration, writes this week about the escalating national controversy over school vouchers. Desa Philadelphia, a native of Guyana, taught English for a year before coming to TIME; her dad once served as a school headmaster, while her mom worked for the Ministry of Education. Desa writes this week's education news briefs, with help from writer Jodie Morse, writer-reporter Amanda Ripley and stringer Alice Jackson Baughn. The head reporter for the section is Victoria Rainert (who turned down a teaching job for journalism).

Our new section is led by assistant managing editor Dan Goodgame, whose wife teaches English at a community college. They have three sons in public schools, and Dan says they're "reintroducing me to the joys of algebra."

At the end of this school year, we plan to select a TIME School of the Year, to be featured in our Education Special Report. That school won't necessarily be the "best" as measured by test scores or the consensus of educators, but rather a school that this year offers inspiration in the obstacles it has overcome, the results it has shown or the innovations it has employed.

Our website, time.com has created an online companion to our Education Special Report, which will include a weekly column by Jodie Morse and links to useful information related to our stories.

Walter Isaacson, Managing Editor