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As the Industrial Revolution reshaped American society at the beginning of this century, the philosopher John Dewey wrote: "Our social life has undergone a thorough and radical change. If our education is to have any meaning for life, it must pass through an equally complete transformation." Out of that impetus, the 20th century public school system was born.

Today, at century's end, new forces are again altering American life. Skills and innovation drive growth and prosperity in the New Economy of the Information Age. Changes in our social structure require a new balance between work and family. Global economic competition means that American schools must be transformed again.

But before any profound change can occur, we first need an honest assessment of the status quo.

Today, America is a tale of two public school systems: one that works reasonably well, although it could certainly be better, and one that is by almost any standard a disaster. The one that's enjoying reasonable success is found in affluent and suburban communities, where most students stay in school and continue their education after high school. Despite great pockets of mediocrity, test scores in these schools often compare favorably with our global competitors, and parents, for the most part, are satisfied.

The school system that is failing is found in poor communities. Dropout rates are high, and even the students who graduate often lack the skills to get jobs. Test scores are abysmal - worse than almost any other developed country. Satisfied parents are almost non-existent.

The challenge for both systems is the same: to give students the skills they need to succeed in the New Economy and to fully participate in American life as citizens. But they are very different in degree. The challenge for urban school systems is urgent: they need a complete overhaul. The dramatic turn-around of the Chicago public schools is encouraging, but unfortunately, an anomaly. Millions of youngsters in too many big cities are being denied the quality education they need for an equal opportunity to climb the economic ladder. Suburban school systems must also improve to meet the challenges of the New Economy. But their challenge is to root out mediocrity where it exists.

And while parents, not governments or schools, bear the responsibility for raising children, schools can no longer be norm-free zones. Schools are where children become young adults and learn the habits of American citizens. The curriculum, and the learning environment, must reflect and reinforce the values that bind us as Americans. Schools must become repositories not only of knowledge, but of standards; not only of learning, but of values. They should at once encourage individual achievement, demand discipline, and reinforce community.

Above all, they should be safe.

The tools for lifting the performance of both mediocre and abysmal schools are the same: set high standards, offer parents and students public school choice with real competition among schools, and demand real accountability.

Despite the clear need for change and many commendable efforts at reform, the bottom line is that the kind of systemic overhaul necessary to offer all students a high quality public education is not taking place. That's why the time has come for a whole new look at public education - not just inching ahead with incremental reforms, but a total transformation of how we educate our children.

In this issue of Blueprint, we present some of the most innovative thinking on school reform today. Our writers discuss a broad full range of challenges to our educational system, and present compelling possible solutions.

To spark the discussion, Blueprint also offers its own list of 10 key ideas for retooling public education for the Information Age. Taken together, these reforms would transform the school system from one designed to serve the adults who run them, not the children who depend on them.

1. Provide Choice with Choices. Our public education system is still too monopolistic. In too many cases, it offers a "one-size-fits-hardly-anyone" model that strangles excellence and innovation. We must offer parents a plethora of choices about what types of public schools their children may attend. Giving them the freedom to make those choices unleashes the power of market competition where it is needed most.

For nearly two decades, blue ribbon commissions have produced volume after volume of recommendations on how to improve public schools. However, the guardians of the status quo - members of the education establishment - have had little incentive to change. We need a public school system where the choice for failing schools is simple: Change or perish.

After ten years and thousands of successful models, it is time to declare that charter schools work. These flexibly organized schools - which receive relief from red tape in exchange for results - have become oases of innovation in a larger desert of monopolistic and cookie-cutter schools. The time has come to bring life to the rest of the desert - by introducing the same forces of choice and competition to every public school in America.

We should rid ourselves of the rigid notion that public schools are defined by who owns and operates them. In the 21st century, a public school should be any school that is of the people (accountable to public authorities for its results), by the people (paid for by the public), and for the people (open to the public and geared toward public purposes). The school system of the future should be a network of accountable schools of all shapes, sizes, and styles with their own decision-making authority - each of which competes against the others for its students.

2. Make Every School a High-Performance School. Every school should be forced to sign a performance contract that sets clear goals for student achievement. Using all the carrots and sticks we have at our disposal, schools should be impelled to reach these goals. Those that fail would have their licenses revoked and be shut down. In diverse neighborhoods all over America there are examples of schools that work and provide their students with a real education. We should not tolerate anything less.

3. Institute National Standards and Testing. If parents are to wisely choose schools for their children, and if schools are to bring real results in the classroom, we need a clear sense of where we are and where we are headed. To understand our starting point in this journey, we must have a comprehensive and cohesive national model for standards and testing. Yet the notion of "national testing" strikes fear and loathing in many political hearts. Too many Republicans are scared off by the word "national;" too many Democrats are worried by the word "testing." Yet national standards and testing do not necessarily mean prescriptions imposed from on-high by the federal government. Instead, America's governors could agree on core standards to be embedded in assessments across state lines. To push them in this direction, the federal government should tie its education dollars to the states' imposing core standards and testing.

4. Push schools toward a 12/12 schedule. In an Information Age with 24/7 cash flows and business cycles, our antiquated public school calendar is still based on the pace and seasons of farm life. Schools should examine ways to operate year round, giving children more instruction time and minimizing the learning they lose over the long summer vacation when working parents must scramble for day care. In addition, public schools should no longer observe "school day" hours. Instead, their doors should be open longer. These extra hours should be used to give children more time to learn and to keep them off the streets while their parents are at work. Schools should also be centers for lifelong learning and community activities. Private and nonprofit operators, using school facilities, can help fill this void. Moving from a nine-month calendar and a seven-hour day toward a 12-month/12-hours-a-day schedule is the best way to advance these goals.

5. Institute Universal Access to Preschool for all Children. Even as we keep students in school for more of the day and the year, we should expand the amount of time they spend learning. As the Industrial Age picked up steam, it became apparent that a high school education was needed for success. In the Information Age, no one disputes the need for post-secondary learning. We must also recognize the importance of pre-kindergarten instruction. Numerous studies have shown that the early years of a child's development play a disproportionate role in shaping its future cognitive abilities. At a time when parents are trying harder than ever to juggle work and family, an investment in universal pre-kindergarten is both timely and urgent.

6. Pay Teachers More, Based on the Improvement they Bring to their Students - and End Teacher Tenure As We Know It. At the core of education is the relationship between teacher and student. Both intuition and research show that good teachers are critical. However, because of low pay and tough working conditions, too few of our brightest young people become teachers. Those talented students who do choose teaching rarely teach in the worst schools - the ones most in need of creativity, energy, and idealism. Worse, teachers - unlike doctors, lawyers, and other professionals - are not usually compensated on the basis of performance.

This should change. Teachers who add value to the classroom by bringing measurable improvements to their students over the course of the school year should receive bonuses commensurate with the increase in their students' achievements. Teachers who perform best should be rewarded most. A performance-reward pay scale would add a material incentive to a teacher's professional and personal dedication to do well by their students. It would also be society's concrete statement of the value of the teacher's work. Special rewards should be offered to teachers who work in the most troubled schools - those where students have the greatest possibility to improve.

When President Clinton, as a candidate in 1992, called for an end to "welfare as we know it," it struck a chord with the American people because welfare represented a system at odds with the basic American values of work, family, and personal responsibility. Today, the practice of teacher tenure - which gives educators a virtual lock on their jobs regardless of how they perform - offends those same values. While we should pay good teachers more, we shouldn't tolerate incompetent teachers at all. America's children deserve at least that. Teachers - like every other employee in the country - should have protection from being fired capriciously or arbitrarily, but they should not be kept in the classroom if they are not up to the job.

7. Let the Best and Brightest Teach. In today's public school system, Bill Gates couldn't teach a class in computer science, Maya Angelou couldn't teach an English course, and Stephen Hawking couldn't teach students physics. That's because education schools still have a stranglehold on who is allowed to enter the classroom. We should certify teachers based on their abilities and knowledge, not on the basis of a degree from an education school.

8. Create a National Teacher Corps. To tap into the determination and energy of young people who want to serve their country as teachers in the toughest schools, we should create a National Teacher Corps where future teachers are sent to the neediest schools in exchange for help in paying for college.

9. Ensure that Character Education is Part of the Core Curriculum. Schools must do more than teach the basic three R's; they must also teach young people about responsibility, reliability, and respect. Children are not born fully formed, but need to be taught the difference between right and wrong. Parents have the primary obligation in this regard, yet schools must play their part in forming the character of young Americans.

10. Give Non-College Bound High School Graduates A Skill Development Option. The New Economy places a high premium on a college education. As a result, the income gap between college graduates and high school graduates is widening. To address this gap, we need new post-high-school institutions that do not sharply separate "training" and "education" as colleges - and that employers view as imparting skills needed for workplace performance at levels as high or higher than four-year colleges. The nation's two-year community colleges are ideally suited to the task.

Horace Mann, the father of America's public schools, called education "the balance wheel of social machinery." Today, for many students that balance is seriously off-kilter. By failing to institute substantial change to our public schools, we doom millions to a bleak future and hinder millions more from reaching their dreams. For Democrats - and for all Americans - the drive to truly improve public education is a test of whether all children are to be afforded the same shot at success that is given to our most privileged children. The future of America will be determined by how well we meet that test.

Al From is the president of the Democratic Leadership Council and publisher of Blueprint.