Waiting For Superman

I am surrounded by people in the helping vocations. My Father and brother are pastor’s, my Mother is a nurse, my wife and my brothers wife are teachers (one in inner city LA at a school featured in the film, both a part of Los Angeles Unified School District), and I worked as a school based therapist in inner city Los Angeles (essentially a Clinical Social Worker). My experience and family environment have informed me and colored my biases about the problems of education - especially in areas where poverty and immigration create challenges for teachers. I have been and am presently surrounded by people in the trenches of the education war.

I was cautious going into “Waiting For Superman” due to its director – Davis Guggenheim. He is responsible for “An Inconvenient Truth,” a film that has polarized while igniting a political fire. On the other hand, his most recent film “It Might Get Loud” inspired me to play music again, and as a result I started a band for the first time in 9 years. To say that Guggenheim’s films leave an impact is an understatement. He gets people to talk.

“Waiting For Superman” chronicles the failure of the public education system. He cites several sources for blame, among these issues are Teacher’s Union’s, lack of accountability, and bureaucracy. The film tells the stories of several children from various neighborhoods in the United States, all but one of whom are from what appear to be low income areas. The film chronicles these children and their family’s journey’s to get kids into Charter, boarding, and other advancement level schools. Meanwhile, several administrators, teachers, and parent’s are given the opportunity to speak up on the issue.

As a film, it looks slick and moves at a good pace in spite of a long running time (the version I saw was 120 minutes long). The students themselves are the highlights – their candid comments and truthful expressions leave an immediate impression. However, for the genre of documentary, this feels less like a documentation of a problem and more like a message movie. My main problem is that Guggenheim plays mostly on his side of the fence and doesn’t present both sides of the arguments.

The main example is with regards to the argument made about tenure and the Union’s power. In the film, we see student captured video of teacher’s getting paid by the state to do little more than babysit as kids play craps and socialize during what is supposed to be classroom instruction. We learn that these teachers got fired as a result of the video. However, we also learn that not only did these teachers get their jobs back a year later, they were back paid for a year’s worth of not teaching. It’s maddening. In addition, Guggenheim alleges that Teacher’s Unions are the most powerful in DC, and have given more money than any other group to Democratic candidates for office. The film appears to allege that a dollar to the Union is a dollar to a Democrat.

But, Guggenhiem never interviews Union members, nor does he spend much time interviewing the teacher’s themselves. What do Union leaders think of his arguments about tenure? What about the pressures teacher’s face to appease unreasonable parent’s (something I have witnessed first hand), peer pressure from card carrying Union members (“side with us, or we won’t be helping you out anymore”), or the natural problems of many “failure factories?” Like, how do you address the fact that students are bringing English written homework home to parents who are monolingual Spanish speaking? What about the devastating effects of poverty – that some elementary and middle school aged children are forced to work because they would rather have food to eat as opposed to doing their homework?

My last social criticism of the film is in Guggenheim’s conclusions. He doesn’t look at the parent’s and make them take responsibility for their children’s performance. True – he does chronicle and we do see parent’s helping their children do homework and fight for the lottery system, but he sees the problem strictly through the lens of the school system itself. Agreed – the school system is a giant mess. However, parent’s have to follow up on their children’s homework, provide accountability at home, and support teachers who at times don’t give their children “good” grades. The school can’t do the parenting part, and Guggenheim’s neglect to confront this is curious, if not frustrating.

That’s a lot of criticisms, but what about the positive? Well, there’s a huge amount to give – this film will provoke you. You will feel sad, you will laugh, and you will be left asking the question “what can I do to help?” On these merits, the film is successful. The film also knows how to balance entertainment with information. His bottom line is glaring – shouldn’t every child be at a school where there are quality teachers who care about the students and do a good job? Why is it that some children get to by chance enter lottery schools, while the rest get the crummy ones? Shouldn’t each child have an equal share of the same slice of educational opportunity? Additionally, Guggenheim’s statistics hurt. The United States is producing 120+ million skilled labor jobs, but due to the poor academic performance of our schools, but we are only producing 50 million qualified students. The labor is being filled elsewhere, because across the globe, we are being beat.

I could continue writing, which I suppose is high praise to the film. See it with your family and think about it. Discuss it – education is the vital component of our nation. But think critically about it – how do you hold your child accountable? How do you support your child’s teachers? My wife saw the film with me and she was engaged wholeheartedly. She later commented that she felt the film could have been even longer. She is right – there is so much ground to cover in a conversation about education. But then again, if I have learned anything over the years, it’s that she is always right.