MOTOKO RICH

On social media and in public rallies, civil rights groups, businesses and politicians expressed dismay at the law, which was passed by the Republican-controlled legislature and signed by the governor within just 12 hours during a hasty special session on Wednesday.

For the first time since 1990, the mathematical skills of American students have dropped, according to results of a nationwide test released by the Education Department.

Every year, more than 600,000 academically promising high school students -- most of them poor, Latino or African-American -- fail to enroll in Advanced Placement courses, often viewed as head starts for the college-bound.

On a recent afternoon, the third-graders in Sharon Patelsky's class reviewed words like "acronym," "clockwise" and "descending," as well as math concepts like greater than, less than and place values. During gym class.