Is Waiting for Superman a Big Business Ploy?

I’m not waiting for Superman. Waiting for Superman, Davis Guggenheim’s new educational film is presently receiving a media blitz. Guggenheim (the son of a documentary filmmaker) funded his film about the perils of the current educational system. In the film, Guggenheim, follows 5 students in their educational journey. According to the Waiting for Superman movie website, ”In spite of their rousing determination and grit, the shocking reality is that most of the film’s touching and funny cast of kids will be barred from a chance at what was once taken for granted: a great American education.” The film breaks up the educational problem into several sections of need: kids, teachers, administrators, unions, schools, states and the nation at large. Inevitably, these kids have one hope of receiving a good education, a lottery system to attend a better public school. The implication that a good education in America today can only take place through a lottery system for specialized schools is simply not true.

I appreciate the attention that the Guggenheim’s movie is giving to education reform, although I do not appreciate the big business media blitz to privatize education. Waiting for Superman is the metaphorical surfboard of big business stakeholders to privatize education for financial gains.

This powerful movement of policymakers superimposing structure to the educational system started back in the 1980s. Nicholas Lemann stated in a 1997 issue of Atlantic Monthly that in the 1980s “the idea of raising standards in public education emerged as a national cause.” In 1983 the National Council for Excellence in Education commissioned by the Reagan administration produced a report, A Nation at Risk. This report identified a national education crisis and recommended nationwide administration of standardized testing by states and the local educational systems. The use of the testing data was to better diagnose and evaluate student progress. “The view in the education world (was) that politicians never before tried to dictate specific teaching methods to this extent,”(Lemann, 1997).

With standardized testing came the creation of businesses to produce the books and products for the schools to utilize to accomplish their testing goals. Today, educational concerns are many. For over twenty-five years, big business has been riding on the backs of policymakers’ decisions in the field of education.

The standardized testing market is reportedly a $400 million to $700 million annual business that is largely controlled by three publishers (Harcourt Educational Measurement, CTB McGraw-Hill, and Riverside Publishing, a Houghton Mifflin company) and one scoring firm (NCS Pearson). A unified flow of substance and dollars runs directly from policymakers to textbook companies, leaving school districts with virtually no options. The few options available to districts for purchase and to teachers and students for use are dictated by the same policymakers and companies.

The great hope of America’s youth does not lie in privatizing the public school system, because that benefits the same big business conglomerates, not the students. Waiting for Superman and all of the attention it is receiving directly benefit the movement to privatize education.

In contrast, Race to Nowhere, a student-centered documentary, was made on a shoestring budget of $200,000 dollars. Director Vickie Abeles painted the picture of how today’s youth are struggling in the current system and how a collaborative effort of students, parents, teachers, administrators and community leaders is needed to problem-solve the needs of the today’s kids. The movement to privatize education does not directly benefit from such a collaborative approach.

The message of Race to Nowhere is not implying that a new private educational system is needed for kids to be healthy, happy and whole. The student-centered educational message of Race to Nowhere has been ignored by the media. An Internet search of Waiting for Superman yields 944,000 results, while a search of Race To Nowhere yields only 77,200 results. Why has Race to Nowhere gotten little to no attention from major media sources when compared to Waiting for Superman? It is simple; Waiting for Superman is a movie that has a villain and a quick fix provided big business, while Race to Nowhere calls for a collaborative movement of communities.

Big business will not make any money on students, parents, teachers, administrators and community leaders collaborating for a healthier happier educational system. A fear monger message of a poor kid in the Bronx that can not seem to receive an education unless a private system is created beats the path toward a money making venture.

I’m not waiting for Superman and neither is any kid in our country. What we are waiting for is a grassroots collaborative effort that really puts kids first instead of using them to fuel big business profits.

Colleges Remediate-We Are In a Race To Nowhere

The New York Times reported that City University of New York is not providing higher education but remediation. This is not a shock. Education is currently based on state testing. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, increased the role of the federal government in public education and also expanded the role of standardized testing. These alleged benefits of standardized testing permeate the public educational system causing harm to students, teachers and the future of public education as a whole. Colleges offer remedial, developmental and basic courses.

According to the California Department of Education, the purpose of standardized testing is “to measure how well students are learning the knowledge and skills identified in California’s content standards.” In addition, standardized testing results will assist with focusing curricular instruction and organizing teaching methods. The goals of standardized testing seem to be falling short; instead of measuring student knowledge and focusing instruction and methods, the rigor of testing seems to be a silent erosion of our school system.

According to the California Department of Education website’s data for July of 2008, 13, 237 students took the Math portion of the California Exit Exam and 13, 373 students took the English portion of the exam. 29% of the students passed the Math and 30% passed the English portions of the test for the state. When we superimpose the same standards on every student, teacher and school, we receive results that are disappointing—a race to nowhere.

These disappointing results are rooted in non-profit school communities maintaining for-profit activities, i.e., test scores. Data has become the catch phrase and teacher’s names are associated directly with their student’s scores. Improvement has been demanded on the back of a shocked system, and therefore an increase of assessments and pacing guides has followed. This increase of standardized testing is big business for the private sector.

Now colleges are feeling the results of a broken system. The documentary, "Race To Nowhere", chronicles the culture of today’s youth in public school. According to the documentary, the epidemic of standardized testing has produced a culture for cheating, disengaging students, stress-related illness, depression, burnout, and of compromised young adults seemingly unprepared and uninspired for the future.

Each community can stop the the “Race to Nowhere" by challenging the current system. This documentary is showing all over the the country, go see it. Spread the news to educators, parents, students and your community. Join the "Race to Nowhere" Facebook Page in your area. This is the link for the Los Angeles page. If a page or community group is not available for your area, start one. Let’s continue a dialogue to examine the facts regarding our educational system and make it our own again.