However, aggregated educational outcomes are deceiving.

Not all Minnesotans are finding the educational system to be a tool for their success. Compared with national averages, Minnesota's students of color are worse off. For instance, in 2000, national average graduation rates were 6% higher for Hispanics, 14% higher for Native Americans, and 18% higher for African Americans. [1] This is consistent with numerous other statistics showing a substantial gap in social and economic outcomes for whites and people of color in Minnesota. How can we reverse this trend?

This inequity in outcomes matters to all Minnesotans, because our workforce is becoming more diverse, and this will accelerate as white baby boomers retire. State demographer Tom Gillaspy predicts that over the next 10 years the nonwhite population will grow 35 percent and the Hispanic Origin population will grow 47 percent — while the white population will grow only seven percent. Our future economic success thus depends heavily on the education and skills these populations acquire.

International competition demands increased performance by all. Our state isn't only failing students of color. The Progressive Policy Institute ranked Minnesota's overall workforce education in 2002 at 6^th in the nation, but that of our manufacturing sector at 29^th in the nation. And even allowing that Minnesota ranks high in US comparisons, our poor results on international comparisons bode ill for us in a globalized economy.

Numerous studies have documented that US high school students do not compare well on math and science tests with their peers internationally. A study comparing 10 Minneapolis schools in upper-middle class neighborhoods with similar schools in Asia found Japanese and Chinese students so far outperformed the Minneapolis students there was almost no overlap in scores by the fifth grade [2].

School reform is important, and controversial. Minnesota has been a leader in educational innovation. In school choice, for example, Minnesota's non-traditional and non-public educational choices are increasing in popularity across the state, indicating a broad interest in experimenting to improve outcomes for our children. Many of these choices are particularly important for low-income students who make up 54 percent of charter school students but only 27 percent of the overall student population.

We need a dispassionate assessment: What can we learn from their choices? And how can the community support the success of charter schools, while simultaneously supporting success for the overwhelming majority of students who still attend so-called traditional schools?

Newly legislated funding to support alternative compensation systems in school districts will encourage more innovation across the state, in a wide variety of ways. Which ones will benefit our children the most?