As Terry Stoops wrote, U. S. News could not highlight any schools from North Carolina in the ?Gold? category, and none at all from Wake or Mecklenburg. This is consistent with Leandro, and the findings of Judge Manning.
While Wake seems to be doing a better job of educating ?all? students, the truth simply is: Wake County does not have nearly the percentage of poorer students nor minority students found in Mecklenburg. Poorer and minority students perform somewhat similar in the two systems, when scores are disaggregated, and percentage of total system population considered. Wake has not seen as much ?bright flight? as Mecklenburg, YET.