Evidence-based policies have great potential to transform the
practice of education, as well as research in education. Evidencebased policies couldfinallyset education on the path toward the
kind of progressive improvement that most successful parts of
our economy and society embarked upon a century ago. With a
robust research and development enterprise and government
policies demanding solid evidence of effectiveness behind programs and practices in our schools, we could see genuine, generational progress instead of the usual pendulum swings of opinion
and fashion.