Top 30 Donna Shalala Quotes

We can’t afford as a nation – not because of money but because of our social fabric – to have large numbers of people who are not working.

We are living longer, and we need to live better.

You go to college not only for the latest knowledge but also to meet people from different backgrounds. That’s the genius of the American higher-education system compared with the Europeans’. We don’t simply skim the elite.

By putting people around me who will calm me down and slow me down and make sure I work through an issue.

Our young people are out on the streets looking for parties, a place to dance, looking for a scene. No institutions are providing them with alternatives, fun things to do that don’t necessarily have alcohol at the center.

I have long ties to the women’s community.

What you really remember at the beginning was that you have to throw a budget together. We made some terrible mistakes at the beginning in my own budget that took us at least a year to catch up on.

We need to drive down requirements for the schools. In the 19th century, we increased the quality of the schools by higher education saying, ‘You can’t come in unless you have these skills, unless you’ve taken these courses.’ We did that in Wisconsin when I was there, it helped to transform the secondary school system.

It’s coaches. It’s people that are involved in kids’ lives at every level, and it’s supporting their parents. Their parents need better jobs. So that they can help them with their homework and don’t have to work two jobs.

But for me, it is when a student has died. I find the death of a young person the most difficult and painful of times. To explain it to other young people, to see a bright future snuffed out, is just awful. I am haunted by those deaths.

I have to admit, in January and February I was in an absolute fuzz. I had no one on board. It wasn’t that I didn’t know what I was doing, but we didn’t have all the pieces put together.

The dog doesn’t know the difference between Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, so I have to walk the dog early those days too.

I bring other constituencies – I also have ties to minority communities. And obviously, to the world of world-class research universities. So I can bring some constituencies that I’m used to working with.

I have always hired people of different ages. Young people and older people. People in their 70s and in their 20s. People who are fully capable of talking back to me.

Sure, it is apparent that presidents are looking at polls, but they are also stepping up on issues. President Clinton stepped up on tobacco. He shaped the polls on the tobacco issue.

We have to mainstream everybody. No matter what their circumstances when they were growing up. Part of that is knowing that after they’re finished with school, everybody in this country gets up and goes to work.

I’ve spent my whole life with people underestimating me.

You can’t have a university without having free speech, even though at times it makes us terribly uncomfortable. If students are not going to hear controversial ideas on college campuses, they’re not going to hear them in America. I believe it’s part of their education.

Sex education has to do with what’s in people’s head.

I think anyone that thought that we were coming in as a bunch of liberal Democrats to deliver more large-scale social programs was nuts. I sure didn’t expect it.

I am interested in getting people to use the healthcare system at the right time, getting them to see the doctor early enough, before a small health problem turns serious.

I think President Bush tried to step up on Social Security even though the polls showed that was unpopular. He has not been successful and backed off, but I admire people who take on big problems.

You don’t want to destroy the energy that comes out of a campaign.

The economic dimension is very clear. I was at a dinner party, a mother got up, who’s a very distinguished scientist, and said she had to get home and help her daughter with her homework. The two waiters, their faces changed. They were working their second jobs, they couldn’t get home to help their kids with homework.

In every community, whether large or small, there are people who lead in their community in easy and difficult times.

I would argue that we have a generation of young people, particularly minorities, who are no longer putting up with the kinds of things their parents put up with. They’re much more self-confident. It’s no longer acceptable to make fun of people because of race or sex. But it has always been present in American society.

I get to work at about 7:30 or 8 unless I have a breakfast meeting.

In fairy tales, the children are saved by caring adults. We need more caring adults in the lives of our children.

The government is fully capable of delivering services. Even complex services.

I’m pretty disciplined and am almost always on schedule.