You can see it in the faces of teachers in urban schools.  They worry now about keeping their careers with all this accountability on test scores.  Poverty is the number one problem.  Low paying part time jobs are the problem.  You can't teach a hungry worried little kid to preform well on tests.  New fancy charter schools are being built in my area.  But I can tell you the neighborhood kids that attend them are not getting any better education then my kids.  In fact I think my kids are doing better because they are in public schools.  I know the charter school and the reformers are a big media machine.  Moreover the parents around here send their kids to charters do so because the kid is performing bad in school or they don't want their kids socializing with minorities.  One of the little kids that plays with my grand son goes to a new charter and was sent there because he was not learning to read.  He is in the 5th grade and still struggling to read directions on the games they play.  His mother claims he is doing well now and getting good grades.  His grades he brings home is not a honest assessment of his skills.  They give good grades to keep their enrollment up.  One of these days they will cull him out because he is too far behind when the enrollment has a waiting list. The Dream Defenders here in Florida is a group of very young voters who is very vocal against the pipeline from school to prison in urban areas.  They are making it a political issue here in Florida and the support is growing.