James P. Comer 
What I Learned In School 
Reflections on Race, Child Development, and School Reform

From the Winner of the Grawemeyer Award in Education in 2007

‘In the world of education reform, where silver-bullet ideas, ideologies, and intellectual fashion clamor for influence, James Comer’s thinking has long been a sea of calm, balanced, and humanewisdom focused on the needs of the whole person. Reading Comer yousee the incompleteness of so many other approaches to reform, aswell as learn an integrated approach to making schools work. Andnow, here it all is in a single book. If you want to see howschools can actually work, as opposed to affiliate with a priorbelief about how they should work, this is a must read.’
–Claude Steele, professor, the Center for Advanced Study inthe Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University

‘The best introduction?professional and personal–to theremarkable world of James Comer: physician-educator, parexcellence.’
–Howard Gardner, Hobbs Professor of Cognition and Education, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Cambridge, Massachusetts

‘James Comer is a rare constellation among social scientists: agreat intellect, a keen analyst, a creative problem-solver and aman of enormous empathy. His writings are required reading foranyone interested in education reform or improving the odds forpoor children.’
–Geoffrey Canada, president and CEO, Harlem Children’s Zone

Table of Content

Introduction: What I Learned in School ix

Introductory Remarks at the Grawemeyer Award

Ceremony, David Reynolds xvii

Address at the Grawemeyer Award Ceremony 1

1 Washington Elementary School

MAGGIE’S AMERICAN DREAM 23

2 Me, Walter, and America

BEYOND BLACK AND WHITE 31

3 Three Networks and a Baby

WAITING FOR A MIRACLE 63

4 So You Want to Work in Schools?

MAGGIE’S AMERICAN DREAM 89

5 My Work

WAITING FOR A MIRACLE 95

6 To Leave No Child Behind

LEAVE NO CHILD BEHIND 127

7 All Our Children

MAGGIE’S AMERICAN DREAM 155

Questions for Reflection 157

Index 159

Credit Lines 165

The Author 167

About the author

James P. Comer is the Maurice Falk Professor of Child Psychiatry at the Yale University School of Medicine’s Child Study Center and founder of the Comer School Development Program. A prolific writer, Dr. Comer is the author of nine books and has written articles for Parents magazine as well as syndicated articles on children’s health and development and race relations. In 2007, he received the Grawemeyer Award in education.