‘Waiting for Superman’ Review: A Call to Action

Waiting for Superman isn’t a solution to the education problem in America; it’s a call to action. Written and directed by Davis Guggenheim, filmmaker of The Inconvenient Truth (2006), the documentary demonstrates how high-quality educational opportunities are largely inaccessible and how a child’s future often comes down to chance. Through the stories of five kids, Guggenheim presents the pitfalls of America’s education system—and the disheartening reality of their impact.

Boston University’s School of Education (SED) held a private screening of the film last Thursday at 7:30 p.m. for over 300 students, faculty and alumni at the Coolidge Corner Theatre in Brookline, followed by a discussion led by SED faculty. Tickets were sold at the discounted price of $5. Andrew Barlow, the graduate assistant for SED’s Office of Student Services, helped organize the event.

I caught up with Barlow before the screening and asked him a few questions about Waiting for Superman.

What do you hope people will take away from the film, students in particular?

I think it gives a lot of insight. It brings attention to education, which isn’t something everyone’s always thinking about. I don’t know if it will specifically address all the problems that are in public education, but at least it’s bringing attention to them. People are, maybe, focused on the economy or the environment or things like that when a lot of kids are falling through the cracks, not necessarily because the schools are failing them but just as a public we’re failing them. We need to step in and do something about the public education system. From the reviews I’ve read, it doesn’t sound like it proposes any solutions, but at least it’s making people talk, and I think that’s what needs to be done. There needs to be a dialogue about the situation. I think it’s good for our students because it will give them a lot of questions to ask. They’ve taken all these education classes, and it actually gives them real-life perspective on what they’re learning in the classroom and what’s going on outside of it.

In your opinion, what are some of the major problems facing America’s education system today?

People complain about No Child Left Behind and how it hurts the system because it takes money away from schools that are failing when they actually need the money, and if their schools had more money, they might be able to hire more qualified teachers. It’s not necessarily the teachers—it’s the system. I personally don’t think there’s any one person to blame. It’s the system that needs fixing.

Why do you think Guggenheim chose to call his film ‘Waiting for Superman’?

He’s a character that embodies hope and working hard and helping your fellow man. Growing up, superman was a big facet of my life. When I got older, I realized the bigger message of superman was that mankind should have hope and work together for the future. I think that’s why he chose that title. The movie’s asking for someone to come along and help the education system. Like I said, I don’t think we need to wait for one person. It’s a collective effort. We all need to—as a community, as a country—step in and solve this problem.

Meet Anthony, Francisco, Bianca, Daisy and Emily. These children are growing up in areas where only a handful of schools have the resources to provide them with the skills necessary to graduate high school and attend college. Without a guaranteed a place at these schools, their chances of getting in are often less than 10 percent. All they can do is enter into a lottery and hope.

In the documentary, Guggenheim says, “We place our children and their future in the hand of luck.” According to the filmmaker, their situation is not unfamiliar. There are more than 2,000 so-called “drop out factories” throughout the United States.

Guggenheim interviews Michelle Rhee, Head of Washington D.C. Schools since 2007, and examines the dramatic steps she has taken to improve D.C.’s education system. Not everyone, however, has supported her actions, especially the National Education Association (NEA) and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). Although Rhee has succeeded in closing a number of failing schools and firing a handful of ineffectual principals, she faces the same brick-wall bureaucracy that prevents schools from advancing. Her attempts to do away with tenure, a teacher’s contractual right to his or her job, have met strong rebuttal from teachers unions. Even if teachers are terrible at their jobs, those who have been granted tenure are nearly impossible to fire. At the same time, teachers who are excellent at their jobs cannot receive better salaries because it violates the teachers union contract. Unlike other professions, such as business, law and medicine, education is not based on performance and incentive.

In the documentary, Rhee claims that adults care more about themselves than the kids they’re teaching, and therefore, they turn a blind eye to the injustices happening in schools. “You can’t have a great school without great teachers,” Rhee argues. You also can’t have a successful economy without an educated workforce, says Bill Gates, whom Guggenheim also interviews in the film.

Additionally, the documentary explores the impact of former president George Bush’s education initiative “No Child Left Behind” and the responsibility of federal and state governments to public education. For example, would the problem of failing neighborhoods be solved if more money was spent improving their schools? Would the problem of crime diminish if more money was invested in education? With a Massachusetts referendum on this year’s ballot for cutting the state sales tax from 6.25% to 3%, these questions are extremely relevant.

Guggenheim also looks at education from a historical perspective. Schools, public and private, were once seen as a ticket out for the poor. Now, the ticket has a price tag that comes in the form of moving to a richer area that has good schools available or paying private school tuition, and the achievement gap between rich and poor continues to expand.

Charter schools may offer a solution. Guggenheim interviews Geoffrey Canada, founder of the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP), a countrywide system of charter schools that takes a different approach to education. He asks the question “What if we never let kids get behind?” The schools establish a pipeline that follows kids closely throughout their education and ensures that they graduate. They emphasize achievement as a road to success. “We know it’s a lie that disadvantaged kids can’t learn. They do better than other poor kids and everyone, shattering the myth that these kids can’t learn,” Canada says.

Guggenheim’s interviews with students, parents, teachers, union representatives, legislators, reformers and experts in the education field complement the stories of his five subjects and offer a larger focus to the film. Guggenheim also includes creative animation to visually represent what otherwise would have been abstract facts and figures in a way that was not only entertaining but also meaningful.

While some may view the documentary as a melodramatic, apocalyptic representation of the state of America’s education system, the viewer can’t argue with statistics. At the same time, Guggenheim overlooks some things. Not all charter schools are as successful as KIPP, and they aren’t the answer to the larger problem of the failing public school system. In addition, teachers unions are more than just impediments to progress. They were initially created to protect teachers from being fired for unjust reasons. Moreover, the film focuses on children who have supportive parents that care about their future and push them to succeed. What about the kids not only facing the same problems but also dealing with broken homes? The film concludes with the fates of the five children, two of whom are admitted into the charter schools and three of whom are not accepted. The film forces us to ask, what is our obligation to others, to ourselves? If we give up on education, what is the result?

After the screening, SED Dean Hardin L. K. Coleman opened discussion of the film. Ben Carter, a first-year doctoral student in BU’s Education Leadership Program who teaches math and religion at Boston Trinity, a private secondary school in Boston, reflected:

“I’ve been teaching for 11 years, in the city predominantly. I really want to build schools, and after seeing the film and working in the city, it breaks my heart because these are the children across the country. And the fact that in some sense we’re allowing students to fail at this rate is kind of ridiculous. The fact of the matter is that we are privileged to be here, and I guess my charge to all of you is that you really take the things that you saw and take your courses seriously and do everything you can to find ways to educate every single child, because there shouldn’t be an elite group that makes it just because, because if you look, you see kids who could have made it but weren’t given the opportunity, so it doesn’t have anything to do with being elite. It has to do with access to education, and if we could just provide access to all kids, then I think we would see a different America.”

Guggenheim takes a creative approach to the film, using a variety of media to ask thought-provoking questions about America’s debilitated education system, and invites us to answer them: A

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