This document summarizes in non-technical terms the preliminary policy-relevant findings of a national evaluation of the Emergency School Aid Act (ESAA) Basic and Pilot Programs during the second year of program operations, 1974-75. An attempt is also made to relate the second year results to findings in the first evaluation year, 1973-74. A major objective of the study has been to assess the overall impact of the ESAA Basic and Pilot programs on students' academic skills and on certain desegregation-related outcome measures. Accordingly, results of the impact analyses are reported here. However, it has been apparent from the earliest stages of data collection that the results of any such overall impact study would almost certainly be difficult to interpret because of the wide variations found among local ESAA projects with respect to specific project goals, approaches taken to reach these goals, and the magnitude and quality of project resources applied to the goals. In such an evaluation, the deficiencies of some projects may obscure the successes of other projects. Accordingly, this report places considerable emphasis on the identification of elements of characteristics of the school programs that seem to have helped disadvantaged students, regardless of the source of funding for those programs. (Author/RC)