Young children give us glimpses of some things that are eternal.

We continue, however, to write about important people, prize-winning people, blacks of grandeur, women of great fire, fame or wit. We do not write about ordinary people.

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.

What I tell these young people is, the world is not as dangerous as the older generation would like you to believe. Anyone I know who has ever taken a risk and lost a job has ended up getting a better one two years later.

Apartheid does not happen spontaneously, like bad weather conditions.

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

False hope is worse than despair.