'Waiting for Superman' praised by the ... Huffington Post?
His [Davis Guggenheim's] new film, Waiting for Superman, which screened Thursday night at the Silver Docs Festival in Silver Springs, Maryland, and opens this September, is nothing less than a wake-up call to all Americans. It is both a searing indictment of our education system and a desperate call-to-action to save our struggling schools.There's a lot more goodness in the article (and tantalizing, but heartbreaking, descriptions of the film), so be sure to read the whole thing.
According to the film's grim statistics, the crisis is more severe than most of us realize. Public schools are failing millions of American children with 1.2 million dropping out every year. We have doubled the per-pupil federal spending, but achievement has flatlined, and this generation of Americans will be the first to be less literate than the previous one. And while the United States was once the world's gold standard for academics, we now rank 25th in math and 21st in science among 30 developed nations.
Our schools are a disgrace, and rather than intelligence or character, a child's destiny is often determined by his or her zip code. ...
This is a dangerous movie, particularly for the teachers' unions. Guggenheim argues that the main problem with schools is bad teachers; but tenure, built into the unions' contracts, prevents schools from getting rid of them.
Also read John Nolte's recent piece on education: 'Waiting for Superman': If you really want 'social justice,' demolish the teachers' unions.
And if you haven't seen it yet, watch the trailer!
