"Edison invented a new category of company. It created this field and others have expected, perhaps, to come into the marketplace in its wake. Well, they may be disappointed..."

Diana Henriques, a veteran business reporter for The New York Times and a correspondent for FRONTLINE's "Public Schools Inc.," discusses Edison's recent efforts to achieve profitability, the challenges it faces as a business, and how it has responded to its many critics.

"Like it or not, Whittle is a symbol. He's a bête noir of the liberal left, which sees him as, if not the devil, then something close. He's also a symbol for the right, which sees him as a battering ram to break apart public education."

A longtime education reporter, and a correspondent for FRONTLINE's "Public Schools Inc.," John Merrow of PBS's The Merrow Report talks about what Edison Schools has achieved educationally, the obstacles it still faces, and what Chris Whittle represents to the education world.