Children sometimes understand things that most grown-ups do not see. — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
It is a commonplace by now to say that the urban school systems of America contain a higher percentage of Negro children… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
I believe we need a national amendment which will guarantee every child in America the promise of not just an equal education… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Unlike these powerful grown-ups, children have no ideologies to reinforce, no superstructure of political opinion to promote, no civic equanimity or image… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
No Child Left Behind widens the gap between the races more than any piece of educational legislation I've seen in 40 years.… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
But for the children of the poorest people we're stripping the curriculum, removing the arts and music, and drilling the children into… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Childhood is not merely basic training for utilitarian adulthood. It should have some claims upon our mercy, not for its future value… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Our nation's oldest sin and deepest crime is the isolation of minority children - black children, in particular - in schools that… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
The last thing the theatre owners wanted was for people who spent $200 to see 'Les Miserables' to come out again and… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Like grain in a time of famine, the immense resources which the nation does in fact possess go not to the child… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Competitive skills are desperately needed by poor children in America, and realistic recognition of the economic roles that they may someday have… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
I have been criticized throughout the course of my career for placing too much faith in the reliability of children's narratives; but… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
The trouble is not that schools don't work; they do. They're excellent machines for achieving historically accepted purposes. In suburban schools are… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
President Obama's first term in office has been better for intentions than for actual changes in planning and policy. I do believe,… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
“Research experts want to know what can be done about the values of poor segregated children; and this is a question that… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
'Savage Inequalities' was about school finance, and 'Amazing Grace' primarily dealt with medical and social injustices in New York. But with 'Ordinary… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Good teachers don't approach a child of this age with overzealousness or with destructive conscientiousness. They're not drill-masters in the military or… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Childhood ought to have at least a few entitlements that aren't entangled with utilitarian considerations. One of them should be the right… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
No matter what happens in a child's home, no matter what other social and economic factors may impede a child, there's no… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Hypersegregated inner-city schools - in which one finds no more than five or ten white children, at the very most, within a… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Instead of seeing these children for the blessings that they are, we are measuring them only by the standard of whether they… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
At present, black children are more segregated in their public schools than at any time since 1968. In the inner-city schools I… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
No Child Left Behind's fourth-grade gains aren't learning gains, they're testing gains. That's why they don't last. The law is a distraction… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Children are not simply commodities to be herded into line and trained for the jobs that white people who live in segregated… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
People rarely speak of children; you hear of 'cohort groups' and 'standard variations,' but you don't hear much of boys who miss… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
I don't know if anything I write will endure, but I do try to write it as a narrative that will not… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Let's concede that we have decided to let our children grow up in two separate nations, and lead two separate kinds of… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
“We should invest in kids like these," we're told, "because it will be more expensive not to." Why do our natural compassion… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
More money is put into prisons than into schools. That, in itself, is the description of a nation bent on suicide. I… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
There is something deeply hypocritical in a society that holds an inner-city child only eight years old "accountable" for her performance on… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
I write books to change the world. Perhaps I can only change one little piece of that world. But if I can… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
In many of the high schools in the South Bronx, more children will end up in prison than will go to college. — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Congress has an opportunity to take advantage of the opening created by Justice Kennedy later this year when it reauthorizes the federal… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
We know that segregation is evil. We know that the sickest children should not go to the worst hospitals. — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
If there are amazing graces on this earth, I believe that they are these good children sent to us by God and… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
'Death at an Early Age' was about racial segregation in Boston. 'Illiterate America' was about grownups who can't read. 'Rachel and Her… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
We know that segregation is evil. We know that the sickest children should not go to the worst hospitals. No, I refuse… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
A great deal has been written in recent years about the purported lack of motivation in the children of the Negro ghettos.… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Placing the burden on the individual to break down doors in finding better education for a child is attractive to conservatives because… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Political struggle is the most important thing any of us can do as a citizen in a democracy; and that means the old joining… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
The future teachers I try to recruit are those show have refused to let themselves be neutered in this way, either in their private… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Separate and unequal didn't work 100 years ago. It will not work today. — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
“Unless we have the wealth to pay for private education, we are compelled by law to go to public school—and to the public school… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
At present, black children are more segregated in their public schools than at any time since 1968. In the inner-city schools I visit, minority… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
“I want to correct something I told you once,' she says. 'You asked me once if I thought white people wish that Puerto Rican… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Let's concede that we have decided to let our children grow up in two separate nations, and lead two separate kinds of lives. If,… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
Our political establishment refuses to use the word 'segregated.' They call the schools diverse, which means half black, half Hispanic, and maybe two white… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
'Savage Inequalities' was about school finance, and 'Amazing Grace' primarily dealt with medical and social injustices in New York. But with 'Ordinary Resurrections,' I… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
If you could lead through testing, the U.S. would lead the world in all education categories. When are people going to understand you don't… — Jonathan Kozol Copy Share Image
