An alarming report on the current state of excellence in the United States has been released. The conclusion of the report “Talent on the Sidelines: Excellence Gaps and the Persistence of America’s Permanent Talent Underclass” is that the United States is relying on less than half of its talent, with large percentages of our brightest students not even getting a chance to enter the room. University of Connecticut Professor Jonathan Plucker and colleagues at two other universities examined data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and state assessments. Their most striking finding is the under-representation of low-income and minority students among those performing at the highest levels of academic achievement.