U.S. School System

ople across the United States and the world, this film was an unabridged, unobstructed public viewing of the U.S. school system, and sadly, the many ways it has failed. A resonating theme throughout the movie was how common bickering amongst adults, is ultimately affecting our children, our future. The documentary establishes five different storylines as it depicts five students, all differ in grade level, social and economic backgrounds, and gender. What they all have in common, is that they are all searching for a coveted spot in a charter school.

From this documentary I learned that our history of public schools is not as spotless as we are led to believe. These five children in the movie gave a face to the millions of children across the United States that unfortunately and sadly pitted against the same problem, which is a public education system that views them as statistics that ultimately keep the archaic system in place. Despite all the accolades and honors that are bestowed upon students, the majority of them are doomed to follow a bureaucratically developed path, that is in actuality, in the teachers favor.

I find it amazing to believe that this system allows trumping of the students welfare. All this time I believed that schools have to follow processes set by the government.I was not aware that the teachers union had such a stranglehold on the public education system. The instances of all these powerful people were put in charge of education overhaul, and then promptly resigned from the position months later allowed me to believe just how much of a problem is to overcome these barriers. For example, in one video clip they actually show the teacher who was falling asleep, or the children playing dice games in an actual classroom, while these teachers were allowed to keep their positions, for years nonetheless, were absolutely incredulous I used to believe that tenure was a great thing to have. Now I see the error of my ways and how it can act as a deterrent to actually helping our kids and allowing earnest and eager teachers an opportunity to teach, and therefore affect our students positively.

1) What is the role of parental involvement in improving education? Describe 3 specific examples from the film.

As I viewed the film, I realized that there are no incentives for "good" or "effective" teachers, and started to realize the importance of parental involvement in improving education. The film follows the parents of several of these children as well, and they all played active roles in their sons or daughters lives specifically the mother from the Bronx, or the mother from Harlem, or the father from South Los Angeles, who all value the importance of education that came from disadvantaged backgrounds and were fighting valiantly to provide a better education for their children. All of these parents shared in their responsibility to their child/children