Education Law

American School Board Journal reviews Waiting for Superman

American School Board Journal’s Editor-in-Chief Glenn Cook posted a review of the new documentary Waiting for Superman.

Cook noted:

From an entertainment standpoint, and thanks to an almost unparalleled marketing campaign, Guggenheim has ramped up the debate about our nation?s public schools in a way that the best films do. He hitches the narrative to sympathetic, interesting characters and draws them into a sort of good vs. evil battle with the highest stakes of all ? the education of our children. But in doing so, he also misses the mark.

By casting teachers, and more specifically, teachers unions as the film?s villains, Guggenheim goes for an easy target. Examples of school boards and traditional administrators are shown in films made in the 1950s and ?60s. And while the brush is not quite broad enough to paint charter schools as the be-all, end-all for public education ? more than 80 percent underperform their traditional counterparts ? the only success stories shown in the film are charters.

Check out the full review in School Board News Today.

BoardBuzz would like to know if you plan to see Waiting for Superman once it comes to your city?

Full post as published by BoardBuzz: NSBA's Daily Weblog on September 26, 2010 (boomark / email).