The inroads made by the education reformers go all the way to the top -- to President Obama, Education Secretary Arne Duncan and the "Race to the Top" initiative that required states to make reforms to get federal education funds -- and they amount to a major shift for the Democratic Party on one of its signature issues. "These are some of the most high-profile Democrats out there," Rhee says, also mentioning Chicago's Rahm Emanuel, Philadelphia's Michael Nutter, and her husband, Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson. "They are taking on the unions. They are fighting for what they believe in. It definitely signals a new day."

Rhee and I were talking in an empty movie theater a few blocks away from the Democratic convention, where she was hosting a screening of a new feature film starring Maggie Gyllenhaal and Viola Davis that's being touted as this year's "Waiting for Superman" -- the blockbuster documentary that galvanized audiences even as it infuriated many education advocates. "When I was a kid, I asked my dad, 'What's the difference between a Democrat and a Republican?' And he said, 'Well, Republicans care more about foreign relations and making money, and Democrats are more about what's going on inside the country and helping the least among us.' And I was like, 'Ah, OK. I'm a Democrat," she says.

"I think this notion that America is the land of equal opportunity and anybody can be successful as long as they work hard and do the right thing -- those are Democratic ideals," Rhee adds. "The most liberal Democratic thing that you could do is get on board with school reform, in my opinion."

To many Democrats, embracing education reform is the only way the party can retain its traditional advantage on education, which Republicans have had increasing success portraying as a wasteful example of big-government excess. Perhaps nowhere is the new consensus more evident than in the way the unions are now scrambling to get in front of a parade that has already left without them. When I call the head of the American Federation for Teachers, Randi Weingarten, to get her take, she insists that it's the unions who are leading efforts to reform education.

"Does public education need to change? Yes," she said. "Do we not change fast enough? Yes. But Democrats are united about the aspiration of ensuring that every single child gets a decent education and that the investment is there to do that."

As evidence that the unions are part of the new solution, Weingarten noted that was invited to speak at a panel at the convention hosted by Democrats for Education Reform. And as evidence that their influence in the party hasn't waned, she pointed out that she was on the Democratic platform committee.

"If we're going to be big-government liberals, we have to be for big government that works, or we're going to lose to the right-wingers who want to devolve everything."

Rhee, however, remains a lightning rod, and Weingarten is eager to depict her as the one who's out of the Democratic mainstream, calling her an "outlier" who "seems to work a lot more with right-wing Republicans than with Democrats." Nor have the unions reconciled themselves with Race to the Top, which Weingarten said "creates winners and losers at a time when we need to be about all kids, not some kids."