Last night, I went against the wishes of my teacher union and went to see 'Waiting for Superman' a documentary about the failure of the American educational system. I will say for anyone seeing this film it would be hard to watch and not feel outraged. After all, these are your children and they are failing!!! Who wouldn't be bothered by this? Who wouldn't want to be more proactive? Who wants to see children fail? However, once you leave the theater, I would hope that you start to notice some discrepancies from the film and our 'real' schools.For example, the film points fingers directly at bad teachers, complaining that it’s impossible to fire them thanks to teachers unions. Ok, there are bad teachers and it is hard to fire tenured teachers but ...seriously?!? Think about this... Doesn't this feel like an easy answer to a very complex problem? Our schools are failing is a HUGE problem! Is it a coincidence that all of the parents in the film are perfect? Although they are inner city struggling parents they work long hours to send their kids to private charter schools and for tutoring. They research every possible alternative to get their kids into better schools. They support their kids’ educations wholeheartedly. Kudos to these and the parents who care and support their child's education. However, this film never suggests that any of the problems of our educational system might be due to lack of parental interest. Honestly, let's just face it... there are parents out there who can't even tell you the name of their child's teacher! Did the documentary just fail to mention that? Sure, blame the teachers. Blame the teacher unions. Like I said, easy answer to a complex problem.
Further more, the documentary suggest that America's schools are behind with academics compared to other countries, even compared to the 70's. Well, yes they are but did this documentary even bother addressing America’s love for standardized testing? Every year, our students spend a huge chunk of their school years preparing for standardized government tests for school funding. If teachers are busy preparing for a once a year test, when do they have time to work on higher level, independent, and critical thinking skills? Did the documentary bother mentioning the fact that we expect teachers to address and fix every social problem in the country? Yet, in other high performing countries they have a zero tolerance for disobedience in school. Could this be why our schools are failing? Could it be that we are failing because fail to hold our parents, our politicians, and our government agencies accountable? Why other countries are so much more advanced than us? I don't know why America' schools are behind but these are a few thoughts, a few more questions..
OK, I promise to get off my soap box but you make a documentary and suggest that charter schools are the answers? Please 'Superman' come to our inner city school district and check out their charter schools and tell me that those schools are great. Tell me that they are the answer and their parents are more dedicated to their child's education because it it privatized.
The hard truth, there are numerous factors as to why our children are failing. Being a teacher is one of the hardest jobs in the world. You can't make a documentary about education unless you eat, sleep, breathe, and live it. Children are our future. We all know this, we all agree on this. It's been the saying for decade upon decade. So why are our schools failing? Well, it's a question with many answers. I think, if you’re looking for a starting point to understand what the children of this nation go through, this documentary is for you. Admittedly, I was reluctant to see the documentary, after all, I am an educator and it's kind of disheartening, but me being me, I had to see the film for myself. I did find myself agreeing with parts of the movie (and for the record I am not anti-this film) but in the end it did not really show what the American educational experience really entails. Talk to the teachers, culture it up and let's really get the question answered, instead of waiting on superman...
