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

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.

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

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

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.

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.

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