Gladwell is wrong about being able to fix the black-white performance gap in three years using better teachers. Not only does his argument go completely against all the prevailing research, but it doesn't even make sense because every white student would have to be assigned a bad teacher for the numbers to add up. (C.f. Equality & Achievement, Hart & Risley, etc.)
The point being that people make tradition-based voodoo over numbers-backed science all over the place. This is a hugely disruptive opportunity. For example a software company that hires people differently can propel itself to the very top in a span of just a few short years.
Alex, I do not see how the content of the links you posted addresses Malcolm Gladwell's contention that good teachers could close the Black-White gap. To refute that idea one would have to get contradictory data on a scale at least as large as Gladwell's.
I do wonder how much of the black-white gap is due to teachers: I would wager that the teachers(on average) that blacks have are worse than the ones whites get.
