Tracy Kidder Quote
Children get dealt grossly unequal hands, but that is all the more reason to treat them equally in school, Chris thought. I think the cruelest form of prejudice is... if I ever said, 'Clarence is poor, so I'll expect less of him than Alice.' Maybe he won't do what Alice does. But I want his best. She knew that precept wasn't as simple as it sounded. Treating children equally often means treating them very differently. But it also means bringing the same moral force to bear on all of them, saying, in effect, to Clarence that you matter as much as Alice and won't get away with not working, and to Alice that you won't be allowed to stay where you are either.
Tracy Kidder
Children get dealt grossly unequal hands, but that is all the more reason to treat them equally in school, Chris thought. I think the cruelest form of prejudice is... if I ever said, 'Clarence is poor, so I'll expect less of him than Alice.' Maybe he won't do what Alice does. But I want his best. She knew that precept wasn't as simple as it sounded. Treating children equally often means treating them very differently. But it also means bringing the same moral force to bear on all of them, saying, in effect, to Clarence that you matter as much as Alice and won't get away with not working, and to Alice that you won't be allowed to stay where you are either.
Tags:
educational inequity
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About Tracy Kidder
Kidder is considered a literary journalist because of the strong story line and personal voice in his writing.: 5 He has cited as his writing influences John McPhee, A. J. Liebling, and George Orwell.: 127–128 In a 1984 interview he said, "McPhee has been my model. He's the most elegant of all the journalists writing today, I think.": 7
Kidder wrote in a 1994 essay, "In fiction, believability may have nothing to do with reality or even plausibility. It has everything to do with those things in nonfiction. I think that the nonfiction writer's fundamental job is to make what is true believable."