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Tracy Kidder

Tracy Kidder Books

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“There really was, as [Tom] West had often said, more to building a computer than designing and debugging a Central Processing Unit. Someone had to dream up its general outlines in the first place. Someone had to make sure the computer worked compatibly with the company's existing line of peripheral equipment. Someone had to set goals of cost and performance and see that they could be met. 278”

LeadershipMake Sure
Book:The soul of a new machine
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“En route to California I had a few drinks with an American executive for Falstaff Brewing Company who said he'd been a hobo from '37 to '39. He talked about a friend of his who had lost his legs beneath a freight train and died. He told me he knew something about farm labor contractors. "Killers," he called them. And said it again, "Killers.”

CaliforniaMexicoFarmingMigrantsHobosHoboMexicansMigrant Workers
Book:The Road to Yuba City: A Journey into the Juan Corona Murders
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“Children get dealt grossly unequal hands, but that is all the more reason to treat them equally in school, Chris thought. "I think the cruelest form of prejudice is... if I ever said, 'Clarence is poor, so I'll expect less of him than Alice.' Maybe he won't do what Alice does. But I want his best." She knew that precept wasn't as simple as it sounded. Treating children equally often means treating them very differently. But it also means bringing the same moral force to bear on all of them, saying, in effect, to Clarence that you matter as much as Alice and won't get away with not working, and to Alice that you won't be allowed to stay where you are either.”

EducationEducational Inequity
Book:Among Schoolchildren
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“I have fought the long defeat and brought other people on to fight the long defeat, and I'm not going to stop because we keep losing. Now I actually think sometimes we may win. I don't dislike victory. ... You know, people from our background-like you, like most PIH-ers, like me-we're used to being on a victory team, and actually what we're really trying to do in PIH is to make common cause with the losers. Those are two very different things. We want to be on the winning team, but at the risk of turning our backs on the losers, no, it's not worth it. So you fight the long defeat.”

Paul FarmerThe Long Defeat
Book:Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World
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“Paul is the model of what should be done. He's not a model for how it has to be done. Let's celebrate him. Let's make sure people are inspired by him. But we can't say anybody should or could be just like him." He added, "Because if the poor have to wait for a lot of people like Paul to come along before they get good health care, they are totally fucked.”

HealthcarePaul Farmer
Book:Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World
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“And I can imagine Farmer saying he doesn't care if no one else is willing to follow their example. He's still going to make these hikes, he'd insist, because if you say that seven hours is too long to walk for two families of patients, you're saying that their lives matter less than some others', and the idea that some lives matter less is the root of all that's wrong with the world.”

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Book:Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World
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“The goofiness of radicals thinking they have to dress in Guatemalan peasant clothes. The poor don't want you to look like them. They want you to dress in a suit and go get them food and water. Comma.”

ThinkingWantLooksWaterPoorClothesDressesSuitsRadicalPeasantsGoofiness
Book:Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World
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“Most teachers have little control over school policy or curriculum or choice of texts or special placement of students, but most have a great deal of autonomy inside the classroom. To a degree shared by only a few other occupations, such as police work, public education rests precariously on the skill and virtue of the people at the bottom of the institutional pyramid.”

PeopleLittlesSchoolChoicesDealsVirtueTeacherTeachingSpecialPolicyStudentsSkillsDegreesPoliceBottomOccupationClassroomAutonomyPyramidsCurriculumPublic EducationPlacementPolice Work
Book:Among School Children
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