President-elect Joe Biden’s education secretary nominee, Miguel Cardona, opens a new chapter as that of Trump-appointee Betsy DeVos’s closes. Should the Senate confirm Cardona, it will fall to him to “ensure that no child’s future is determined by their ZIP code, parents’ income, race, or disability,” as the Biden-Harris platform put it.

Stubbornly high achievement gaps between disadvantaged students and their more affluent peers continue to frustrate the realization of such ambitions.