Amartya Sen Quotes

I don't think that I need to tell you how important to the outcome of that race is the education legislation that is now before the Congress. I hope that it is important enough that most of you have studied it in detail. I hope that you understand that it represents the very best thinking that the leading educators of this country can produce.

The more freely information flows, the stronger the society becomes, because then citizens of countries around the world can hold their own governments accountable. They can begin to think for themselves.

If you had to explain America's economic success with one word, that word would be "education".... Until now, the results of educational neglect have been gradual - a slow-motion erosion of America's relative position. But things are about to get much worse, as the economic crisis ... deals a severe blow to education across the board.... We need to wake up and realize that one of the keys to our nation's historic success is now a wasting asset. Education made America great; neglect of education can reverse the process.

There are many challenges in the global education ecosystem: from top-down systemic issues in how educational services are organized and delivered, to bottom-up issues of curriculum effectiveness, accountability, and human resource allocation.

No Child Left Behind's fourth-grade gains aren't learning gains, they're testing gains. That's why they don't last. The law is a distraction from things that really count.

Everybody keeps saying that India's a poor country. Yes, we have poverty. But I blame the government of India, the political establishment, for their failure to educate and therefore their failure to control the poverty.

I'm not one of those who thinks the only way to fix what's wrong with American education is to throw more money at it. We also need to do it much better.

I believe the government should ensure all children are provided with a good education.

In the rush to become all things to all people, the federal government has lost sight of its core responsibilities. As a result we're stuck in this frustrating paradox where Washington actually neglects things it's clearly supposed to be doing, while interfering in other areas where they are neither welcome nor authorized.

Before this government came to power, many failing schools were simply allowed to drift on in a pattern of continuing failure. The government is determined to break that pattern and is successfully doing so.

If you're going to have a public subsidy to education, vouchers are clearly a better way of delivering it. They should result in some loosening up and privatization of the government school system.

I'm a little bit tired of people getting credit for improving education by doing the cheapest thing they can do, which is to call for the manipulation of test scores or to create new standards.

Private sector cannot substitute the role of the government in primary education.

We have to demand that governments live up to their promises and make education a reality for every child.

I think that's what we don't understand as human beings is this is America. It's a democracy. Once we get whoever we want into the White House, even the person we want to get in the White House doesn't get in the White House. We have every right to not only criticize that person but demand that person does what it is we need to get done. That just happens with us mobilizing and us using our voices to talk to the mayors, the governors and the presidents.

Wikileaks is a democratizing force. Its giving individuals access to decisions and thinking by their representatives and in a democracy that ought to be reflexive.

Public education is a great instrument of social change. Through it, if we so desire, we can make our country more nearly a democracy without classes. To do so will require the efforts of us all-teachers, administrators, taxpayers and statesmen. Education is a social process, perhaps the most important process in determining the future of our country; it should command a far larger portion of our national income than it does today.

A true patriot does not confuse government with country. A patriot's loyalty is to his country, and loyalty to country requires holding government accountable.

When government misleads the country about a terrorist attack, that erodes trust.

I never hear anything about education. Education - I guess it's just not sexy enough. And everybody claims to love their children and our children are the most important thing, but if that's the case, how come we never hear more about education as an election issue?

The Government has already U-turned today and I think the pressure is clearly growing for proper accountability over what this Government's negotiating position is on Brexit.

I think it is absolutely reprehensible to believe that any member of this House, Democrat or Republican, would want to do anything that would jeopardize the ability to find out exactly what happened leading up to hurricane Katrina and exactly what happened in the aftermath.

People don't like land mines, especially the survivors and the people who are living in the countries with them. They think they are cowardly, like we do, so I think it's down to the governments to actually just listen to the people and sign the treaty and get rid of all these things and there would be an end to it.

South Korea from a country that had relatively little primary education became close to universal literacy in the course of 25, 30 years, in a way trying to replicate what Japan had done earlier. They were learning to some extent from the Japanese experience too. So I think, in a sense, the East Asians were following a path, which all other countries including South Asia could follow but chose not too.

I think the prospect of bringing back grammar schools has always been wrong and I've never supported it. And I don't think any Conservative government would have done it.