Nearly 140 students, faculty and staff members attended the SESP film showing and panel discussion of Waiting for Superman on October 12. In the discussion following the screening, SESP professors James Rosenbaum and Carol Lee offered comments to put the film into perspective.
The new documentary film by Davis Guggenheim addresses the issue of school reform, a topic of great interest to the SESP community. While Rosenbaum praised the film as effective, appealing and important, he maintained that it is oversimplified. "There's a villain and a victim and a hero. Education doesn't work that way," he said. Only three reforms were emphasized in the film — bashing unions, firing teachers and privatizing schools — although there are many other reforms to be considered, he noted.
The film criticizes the intricacy and inequality of the U.S. education system, and Rosenbaum agreed that "the problem of conflicting standards creates enormous difficulties." The movie's central motif of the lottery for spaces in successful charter schools was important, he said, not just because of the suspense it creates but also because "education should not be rationed so that so few get it." Often movies have a neat ending, but "this movie makes it clear that we cannot stop worrying," he said.
"Currently the problem that I worry about is keeping good teachers," Rosenbaum added, citing the 50 percent turnover rate in teaching. "We have to figure out how to keep the good teachers, and I worry that by picking on teachers we undermine the authority and legitimacy of teachers." He disagreed with making the teachers unions the villains. "Teachers unions are trying to keep teachers in teaching," he said. "Let's see if we can work with teachers unions to improve teaching and keep good teachers."
As for heroes, the film depicts charter schools in this role, but most charter schools are no better than other schools, according to Rosenbaum. "I'm puzzled why America has to privatize schools," he said, when Japan, Finland, and Singapore have the best schools – with no charters and with teacher tenure. These countries give teachers consistent authority, have good teacher training, allow for mentoring and adequate planning time, and provide extra assistance to help teachers who need it get up to speed, according to Rosenbaum, who remarked, "These are things recommended by the 'villain,' the American Federation of Teachers."
Lee commented on the power of the film at the same time as she questioned aspects of the film's message. "The movie has a strong emotional impact, and one of the powerful opportunities it provides is for a wide range of people to have empathy for families with high aspirations but few resources," she said.
As the co-founder of four charter schools in Chicago, Lee has special insight into the challenges of charter schools, which were featured in the film. "Among the major challenges we have faced is to find great teachers," she observed. "The simplistic argument the film has is fire bad teachers and somehow good teachers will emerge." Adding to Rosenbaum's comments on international differences, she noted that the difference between United States and high-achieving nations lies in how they approach the profession of teaching. In Finland, for example, teachers must be at the top of their class and have master's degrees, according to Lee.
Repeatedly, Lee called attention to the politics behind the film. "I'm trying to understand the politics behind the policy debate," said Lee, who questioned who paid for the film. She referred to the movement reflected in current policies such as Race to the Top as having been incubated in Chicago, where the mayor, philanthropic individuals and the Civic Federation developed a business model of opening charter schools and closing underachieving schools.
"We stay in this conundrum because we don't take a systemic view of what it takes to build a system," she commented, noting that the problem is complicated in the US because of a "political dance with 50 states," compared to other countries that have national systems of education.
Pointing out that although Harlem Children's Zone, one of the model charter schools in the film, is a "magnificent model of energizing communities," a recent study found its test scores only in the middle. "Even as we have the simplistic stories, they're never as straightforward as they seem," she said. "There are no super-institutions to follow."
Lee is the Edwina S. Tarry Professor of Education and Social Policy in the Learning Sciences program at Northwestern University. She is the immediate past president of the American Educational Research Association. She is a recipient of the Distinguished Service Award from the National Council of Teachers of English, Scholar of Color Distinguished Scholar Award from the American Educational Research Association, the Walder Award for Research Excellence, the President's Pacesetters Award from the American Association of Blacks in Higher Education and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education. Lee is the author of three books and numerous scholarly publications. Her research focuses on ecological influences on learning and development.
Rosenbaum is professor of sociology, education and social policy who has influenced government policy with his extensive research on the effects of relocating poor inner-city black families in public housing. A specialist in research on work, education and housing opportunities, Rosenbaum has published four books and numerous articles on these subjects. He has testified before Congressional committees and serves as an adviser to the U.S. Office of Educational Research and Improvement.
Undergraduates in Rosenbaum's Education Policy class and Lee's Race in Education class attended the film showing.