"[C]andid and incisive.... A stark yet enlightening look at American education." - Library Journal; "[A]n account of the search, over the past hundred or so years, to try and discover how educational research might provide reliable prescriptions for the improvement of education. Through extensive use of contemporary reference material, [Lagemann] shows that the search for ways of producing high-quality research has been, in effect, a search for secure disciplinary foundations." - Dylan William, Times Higher Education Supplement