While existing research suggests that schools have only indirect effects on students' racial and political attitudes, the social and demographic characteristics of desegregated classrooms may produce certain normative and behavioral outcomes which encourage children to accept human diversity encountered in concrete situations. This pattern of functional tolerance is a prerequisite for successful participation in the institutions of modern, heterogeneous society, and therefore represents an important aspect of citizenship training in public schools. It can be argued that universalism, achievement, and specificity take an additional significance within the racially and ethnically desegregated classroom. It seems highly probable that the child's prolonged exposure to concrete applications of universalistic standards will have considerable impact on his or her judgments and behaviors in intergroup settings in the school and elsewhere. Children's acceptance of universalistic norms is likely to be of vital importance in their preparation for adulthood. There exists a clear correspondence between those universalistic norms that govern classroom life and the standards which regulate other institutions. The child's experiences in desegregated classrooms may have added value in that they provide exposure to the systematic application of impartial standards across racial lines. (Author/MK)