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 scho…

- James S. Coleman

Grades are almost completely relative, in effect ranking students relative to others in their class. Thus extra achievement by one student not only r…

- James S. Coleman

The higher the social class of other students the higher any given student's achievement.

- James S. Coleman

It is clear from all these data that the interests of teenagers are not focused around studies, and that scholastic achievement is at most of minor i…

- James S. Coleman

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

- James S. Coleman

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

- James S. Coleman

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

- James S. Coleman

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 dist…

- James S. Coleman

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

- James S. Coleman