This study looks at the development of comprehensive education in Tasmania. It suggests that the Tasmanian experience of comprehensive education has been marred by a systemic misinterpretation of the principle. It considers the powerful social factors which militate against the realisation of the comprehensive education principle and questions whether the influence of these factors will ever weaken enough to allow it to succeed. Warrane High School, an urban four year comprehensive high school located east of the Derwent River in southern Tasmania, is the focus of this study. In making judgments about the various intellectual and social aspects of the schools population and in assessing its feeder community, it looks at other studies and considers their findings in the light of the expectations held for comprehensive education. In its final stages, the study examines the federal government's compensatory education programs and then suggests directions that planning for education should take to ensure that the system of education which prevails caters fairly for all children in Tasmania.