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.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes that children should not be viewed as mere resources for labor, especially in racially segregated societies.
Jonathan Kozol's quote critiques the reduction of children to mere commodities, suggesting that their potential and individuality should not be overlooked. It highlights the systemic issues within segregated neighborhoods where the education system often prioritizes job training over holistic development, reinforcing racial inequities instead of fostering an inclusive society that values every child's unique capabilities.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of equitable education for all children.
A great deal has been written in recent years about the purported lack of motivation in the children of the Negro ghettos. Little in my experience supports this, yet the phrase has been repeated endlessly, and the blame in almost all cases is placed somewhere outside the classroom.
Schooling should not be left to the whim or wealth of village elders. I believe that we should fund all schools in the U.S. with our national resources. All these kids are being educated to be Americans, not citizens of Minneapolis or San Francisco.
An awful lot of people come to college with this strange idea that there's no longer segregation in America's schools, that our schools are basically equal; neither of these things is true.
Hypersegregated inner-city schools - in which one finds no more than five or ten white children, at the very most, within a student population of as many as 3,000 - are the norm, not the exception, in most northern urban areas today.
I wrote the first book, and I thought people would say: 'Separate and unequal schools in the City of Boston? I didn't know that. Let's go out and fix it.'
The trouble is not that schools don't work; they do. They're excellent machines for achieving historically accepted purposes. In suburban schools are children of the rich, who grow up to privilege and anesthetic oblivion to pain - and who then use the servants produced by ghetto schools.
A basic element of the American dream is equal access to education as the lubricant of social and economic mobility.
The learning and knowledge that we have, is, at the most, but little compared with that of which we are ignorant.
My books hold between their covers every story I've ever known and still remember, or have now forgotten, or may one day read; they fill the space around me with ancient and new voices.
"It would seem that you have no useful skill or talent whatsoever" he said. "Have you thought of going into teaching?"
Let ignorance talk as it will, learning has its value.
This applies to many film jobs, not just editing: half the job is doing the job, and the other half is finding ways to get along with people and tuning yourself in to the delicacy of the situation.
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