For this fine column on improvements in the Bridgeport schools.

The Bridgeport School District is at the cross hairs of two important issues — state assessment testing and a growing, non-English-speaking population.

About two hours' drive north of Wenatchee off Highway 17, the tiny School District might well be among candidates for the "most improved" award, considering its Washington Assessment of Student Learning performance.

Last spring, 62.1 percent of fourth-graders met WASL standards in reading — a fourfold improvement from 1997.  Fifty percent passed the math portion, up from just 6.5.  And 29.3 percent met writing standards, double the 1997 score.

You'll want to read the whole thing.  I'll just add that the column has not a trace of the "urban imperialism" that I so often see in our Seattle newspapers.

(And though it is on an entirely different subject, Kennewick Man, I have to mention this column, too.  Riley has done a number of fine columns on that subject, better than anything else I have seen in other American newspapers.)