This new report, A Nation Empowered: Evidence Trumps the Excuses Holding Back America's Brightest Students builds on the momentum of the 2004 report, A Nation Deceived: How Schools Hold Back America's Brightest Students. A Nation Deceived initiated a critical dialogue about academic acceleration, an under-used intervention. A Nation Deceived exposed to the nation the inconsistencies between research and practice and brought acceleration to prominence in the field.

Volume 1 and 2 of A Nation Empowered: Evidence Trumps the Excuses Holding Back America's Brightest Students equips students, families, and educators with facts to refute biased excuses. A Nation Empowered shifts the impetus from conversation to action. Empowerement  galvanizes determination with evidence. Volume 1 portrays the determination of students, educators, and parents to strive for excellence. Volume 2 reveals the evidence that trumps the excuses that hold bright students back.

Susan G. Assouline is the director of the Belin-Blank Center at the University of Iowa. She is the Myron and Jacqueline Blank Endowed Chair in Gifted and Talented Education.

Nicholas Colangelo is the Dean of the College of Education at the University of Iowa.

Joyce VanTassel-Baska is the Jody and Layton Smith Professor Emerita of Education and former Executive Director of the Center for Gifted Education at the College of William and Mary in Virginia.

Mary Sharp is an Iowa based writer and editor who has written four books and edited twenty volumes.