Award-winning writer Anne Turnbaugh Lockwood interviews nationally-known leaders in a new genre of conversations about key issues in education that inform the contemporary debate and the general reader. Topics range from the current debate over character education to multicultural education and from multiple intelligences to national standards. Those interviewed include Patricia K. Anderson, Michael W. Apple, Roland S. Barth, Gloria Ladson-Billings, B. Bradford Brown, Kathleen Densmore, Anne Fairbrother, Lily Wong Fillmore, Howard Gardner, Thomas R. Hoerr, Herbert M. Kliebard, Thomas Lickona, Alan L. Lockwood, Fred M. Newmann, Kent D. Peterson, Deborah Prothrow-Stith, Joseph S. Renzulli, Thomas A. Romberg, Kevin Ryan, Mara Sapon-Shevin, Christine E. Sleeter, Theodore R. Sizer, Wayne J. Urban, and Dennis R. Williams. Considered are violence; values; youth culture; cultural diversity in language, race, and ability; professionalism; leadership; the role of teacher unions; and broad perspectives on the status and history of educational reform in the United States.