This article reports on the mission of the Office for Civil Rights in the U.S. Department of Education to ensure equal access to education through compliance reviews. The Office hopes to use these reviews to provide technical assistance to help districts improve their performance. In late March, the Los Angeles Unified School District became the…

College officials worry that too many of their peers use merit aid to "buy" students whose test scores will burnish their institutions' rankings in "U.S. News & World Report." In fact, the debate about financial aid on today's campuses has led to the near vilification of merit aid. The lament is that money is often diverted…