We felt that the Gates Foundation looked at our track record and our publications and decided that "this is persuasive; this needs to be done. Let's see what they can do."

When ownership is local and national, and various stakeholders work together, program innovations have a greater chance to take root and survive.

I came to understand the value of education, not just to enable me to make a good living, but to enable me to make a worthwhile life.

There's nothing worse than a leader who lacks ambition.

Fear of failure is the fuel of achievement. If you weren't afraid to fail, you probably wouldn't be highly motivated to work at the level that most of us have to work at to do well.

The humanities don't belong to some elitist group... knowledge as a whole should be embraced.

the most important thing one can do for children is not accept the limitations they are so willing to impose on themselves.

Strategies for research and policy development must simultaneously address people's needs, the capacity of programs to provide good quality of care, and the range of technological options available.

There is strong mentoring of women in the academy. Corporations appear more willing to resist affirmative action to advance women, and boards and shareholders are more tolerant of this approach.

A longer time perspective is needed because we face a daunting task both in an intellectual and practical sense.

If I can give a very substantial injection of humanistic thinking into corporations, boy, that would change things a lot.

Thus far, the best that could be said for the day was that it was half over.

Buy health insurance, or go to jail.

If the point of life is the same as the point of a story, the point of life is character transformation.

Your dunce who can't do his sums always has a taste for the infinite.

If you don't tell your stories, other people will tell their story about you. It's important that we nurture and protect these memories. Things change. Existence means change.

Our household is built on love and respect. And we don't really let negative vibes stay too long. It's worked out. I got a great family, great kids.

If you truly love someone, you're going to be pure because true love comes from God, and God tells us to remain pure. That's good enough for me.

I always like to say that no matter what you want to do in life, if you stick with it, you're bound to eventually get good at it!

Life begins at forty, but so does arthritis, and the habit of telling the same story three times to the same person.

How many lessons of faith and beauty we should lose, if there were no winter in our year!