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Quote by Jonathan Kozol

“Children are not simply commodities to be herded into line and trained for the jobs that white people who live in segregated neighborhoods have available.”

Quote by Jonathan Kozol

Author

Jonathan Kozol (born September 5, 1936) is an American writer, educator, and civil rights activist, best known for his sharp critiques of inequality in the U.S. public education system. Born in Boston and a Harvard graduate, he taught in Chicago public schools, where witnessing racial segregation and resource disparities led him to advocate for educational equity. His seminal works, including 'Savage Inequalities' (1991) and 'Amazing Grace' (1995), expose the struggles of impoverished schools and have sparked national debate. Kozol's writing blends personal narrative with social analysis, emphasizing education as a fundamental human right. He has received awards such as the National Book Award and the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and continues to speak and write on educational justice. more

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“I emphasize teachers because they are largely left out of the debate. None of the bombastic reports that come from Washington and think tanks telling us what needs to be 'fixed' - I hate such a mechanistic word, as if our schools were automobile engines - ever asks the opinions of teachers.”

Ifs Thinking Needs Government School Hate Asks Left Education Opinion Teacher I Hate Debate Fixed Reports Engines Emphasis Tanks Automobile Left Out Bombastic

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“The greatest difference between now and 1964, when I began teaching, is that public policy has pretty much eradicated the dream of Martin Luther King.”

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“Well, teachers have been profoundly demoralized in recent years and are often treated with contempt by politicians. There's a great deal of reckless rhetoric in Washington about the mediocrity of the teaching profession - and I don't find that to be true at all.”

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“A culture in which guilt is automatically assumed to be neurotic and unhealthy has devised a remarkably clever way of protecting its self-interest.”

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“President Obama still places far too much emphasis on relentless testing with standardized exams.”

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“Separate and unequal didn't work 100 years ago. It will not work today.”

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“The answers I remember longest are the ones that answer questions that I didn't think of asking.”

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“You need massive recruitment to tell the poorest of the poor what is possible.”

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“Apartheid education, rarely mentioned in the press or openly confronted even among once-progressive educators, is alive and well and rapidly increasing now in the United States.”

Wells States United United States Alive Presses Progressive Educator Apartheid

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“By far the most important factor in the success or failure of any school, far more important than tests or standards or business-model methods of accountability, is simply attracting the best-educated, most exciting young people into urban schools and keeping them there.”

People Important School Young Models Standards Tests Exciting Method Factors Educated Accountability Urban Business Models Success Or Failure

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