Ensures that vital information is provided to educators, families, students, and communities through annual statewide assessments that measure students' progress toward those high standards.

When students are grouped by ability, then collaborative work becomes important because this type of learning environment is heavily dependent on team work.

Students can move at their own pace: When students are grouped together based on skill level, the pressure is lessened of when the topic must be covered.

Between-class grouping - a school's practice of separating students into different classes, courses, or course sequences (curricular tracks) based on their academic achievement

Within-class grouping - a teacher's practice of putting students of similar ability into small groups usually for reading or math instruction

Proponents of ability grouping say that the practice allows teachers to tailor the pace and content of instruction much better to students' needs and, thus, improve student achievement.

While localvorism sounds superb in theory, it is proving quite difficult in practice. To begin with, there are dozens of different definitions as to what local is,

Lean finely textured beef is safe, asserts Al Almanza, administrator of USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service.

Considered by the beef industry to be an impressive innovation, lean finely textured beef is made from the remnant scraps of cattle carcasses that were once deemed too fatty to go into human food.