James S. Coleman Quotes on Education (12 Quotes)

The present structure of rewards in high schools produces a response on the part of an adolescent social system which effectively impedes the process of education.

In every school, more boys wanted to be remembered as a star athlete than as a brilliant student.

As an example, one of the schools I have been studying is too small to compete effectively in most sports, but participates with vigor each year in the state music contests.

In a high school, the norms act to hold down the achievements of those who are above average, so that the school's demands will be at a level easily maintained by the majority.

The educational resources provided by a child's fellow students are more important for his achievement than are the resources provided by the school board.

A child's learning is a function more of the characteristics of his classmates than those of the teacher.

Cultural dominance of middle-class norms prevail in middle-class schools with a teacher teaching toward those standards and with students striving to maintain those standards.

I'd propose that each central-city child should have an entitlement from the state to attend any school in the metropolitan area outside his own district - with per pupil funds going with him.

Schools are successful only insofar as they reduce the dependence of a child's opportunities upon his social origins.

Children from a given family background, when put in schools of different social compositions, will achieve at quite different levels.

Particular individuals who might never consider dropping out if they were in a different high school might decide to drop out if they attended a school where many boys and girls did so.

It is one thing to take as a given that approximately 70 percent of an entering high school freshman class will not attend college, but to assign a particular child to a curriculum designed for that 70 percent closes off for that child the opportunity to attend college.