The Mission Statement: just about every American public high school has one. They don’t need one, nor does having one make any school better. They’re all pretty formulaic. Quite a few put “diversity” and “a safe learning environment” in there somewhere, often something about “participation in a global economy,” and “rigor” is, well, de rigueur. But the key word of the typical specimen is some form of “prepare,” though a synonym like “develop” might be used instead. The standard indirect objects of said preparation are college, citizenship, and life. Now, “preparatory” was once the epithet of exclusive schools, usually private or selective public, whose graduates went on to prestigious four-year liberal arts colleges and thereafter joined a social, economic, and political elite. The term “prep school” used to be invidious; but every high school is a prep school now, every high schooler college-bound.