As a parent, I will be breathing a big sigh of relief in a couple of weeks when my older son leaves middle school behind. And the parents of his classmates tell me they will be doing the same. I'm almost expecting that the entire neighborhood will feel the breeze emanating from the middle school auditorium next Wednesday when the whole ordeal finally ends for the lucky 8th graders and their parents.

Remember middle school? No? Maybe you don't really want to...

Here's something that might refresh your memory: the latest edition of Indicators of School Crime and Safety, an annual report from the National Center for Education Statistics, finds that "middle schools were more likely than primary or secondary schools to report racial tensions, bullying, verbal abuse of teachers and widespread disorder in classrooms" in 1999-2000 (the most recent year for which data is available).