What “Waiting for Superman” Got Wrong
“Waiting for Superman” is the latest documentary about the educational achievement gap in America. The film follows six students from poor neighborhoods that are seeking entrance into exemplary charter schools. The movie also features interviews with some notable education reformers (such as Geoffrey Canada, founder of the Harlem Children’s Zone, and Michelle Rhee, former chancellor of D.C. public schools).
I felt conflicted about seeing “Waiting for Superman” because I was told the film was “anti-teacher” and largely pro-charter school. (For the record I am not entirely opposed to charter schools—but I worry that charters are not a sustainable solution for America’s educational problems.)
Now that I have seen the film, I will acknowledge there are a few important truths that it got right.
Truth #1: There is a serious aspiration gap in America.
What I mean by this is: poor kids don’t want to grow up to be barbers, or construction workers or waitresses. If you ask these kids—by and large they want to go college. The movie interviews kids who like math, who want to be doctors, and who are serious about school. The kids featured in “Waiting for Superman” defy the stereotypes that claim poor kids can’t or don’t want to learn. The heartbreaking truth is that most of these kids are stuck in a broken school system and will never get the chance to pursue their dreams.
Truth #2: Poor families DO value their child’s education.
There are some seriously tough, determined, Moms in this movie. We see parents calling teachers, helping their kids with reading, and working extra jobs to pay tuition for their kids. Too often poor parents are wrongfully portrayed as disinterested in the education of their children.
HOWEVER…Despite the film’s positive aspects—I worry that the film presents an overly simplified view of educational inequity.
In one scene—an education reformer states that if we could remove the bottom 6% of teachers in the United States—our educational outcomes would be equal to Finland— the country with the best educational system in the world.
It is true the great teachers can affect substantial change. However, it is extremely hard to predetermine who will make an effective teacher. Our question should be: What is Finland doing to produce great teachers that we’re not doing?
My hunch is that Finland (like Sweden and other Baltic Countries) values teachers more (and pays them better) than we do in America. “Waiting for Superman” points out that doctors, lawyers, CEOs and other professionals are held accountable for their job performance in ways that teachers are not. (Only 1 in 2400 teachers has his/her certificate revoked). However, we also pay doctors, lawyers, and CEOs much more than we pay teachers—and we confer these professionals with much higher status. (It is likely there is some sexism involved in this—other female-dominated professions like nursing and social work often get treated the same way).
If we want better teachers, let’s face it—we’re going to have to make the job better. We ought to demand more from teachers—while also ensuring that they are well paid, supported, mentored, and work in safe places. I often think of pictures a friend once sent me of the Google workplace. The photos revealed an office space complete with a five-star dining facility, on-site masseuses, a gym and other amenities. I wondered—how can we convince enough of our brightest and most talented Americans to work as educators in our toughest schools—when large corporations such as Google can offer them generous salaries and so many job-related perks?
The central “bad guys” in “Waiting for Superman” are the teacher’s unions. It is true that unions have often protected outdated tenure practices at the expense of children. (Although recently unions in D.C. agreed to a proposal that included merit pay for teachers who give up their rights to tenure– a fact the movie omits.) However, to target unions as the root cause of educational inequality is completely misguided.
We live in an extremely capitalist society. Where the gap between the rich and the poor has become vast. That fact that the achievement gap exists is symptomatic of the fact that we live in a deeply segregated and unequal country. Property taxes pay for schools. Hence, schools in wealthy suburbs with high property taxes get lots of money. They pay teachers more—and tend to attract the best ones. Schools in poor neighborhoods don’t get very much money. Therefore, they often cannot hire sufficient numbers of teachers, tend to attract young and inexperienced staff, and often can’t provide basic resources for students. (I once volunteered at a school in Detroit that couldn’t afford enough toilet paper for students.)
This isn’t rocket science. It may not be politically palatable to ask the wealthy to redistribute tax dollars so that poor schools can get a bigger piece of the pie. But we ought to at least acknowledge the unequal funding structures are a large part of the reason why so many inner-city schools are “failure factories”.
Furthermore, we ought to acknowledge that educational inequality has been caused by decades of racial oppression, redlining, white-flight, city-wide corruption, and racist policies (especially post-World War II Veteran provisions which provided student loans and affordable mortgages to whites and denied them to blacks) that have facilitated white ascendancy into the middle class while keeping racial minorities locked into poverty. Not to mention our current political system is heavily influenced by powerful corporate interest groups and has little need to be accountable to the poor. In other words…there is some monstrous inertia behind the achievement gap. If we are going to devise solutions to this issue we had better be clear that bad teachers are only one part of the problem. Moreover, “Waiting for Superman” suggests that teachers exist in a vacuum. Let’s not forget that school culture, administrative leadership, city politics, dysfunctional bureaucracies and educational policies all have the power to set teachers up for success or for failure.
I think what Michelle Rhee was trying to with salary increases for high-performing teachers would have been a step in the right direction, and I was disappointed to see teacher unions get in the way of that reform. Teachers do need more incentive to improve student outcomes, since intrinsic motivation for personal success can only go so far.
Actually, Rhee’s plan to implement pay increases did eventually get approved by the union (it must have happened after “Waiiting for Superman” was filmed). Rhee and Adrian Fenty (D.C. Mayor) speak about the change in their recent essay in the Wall Street Journal (). Although union officials thought that teachers would disapprove of the proposal (in which teachers had the option of waiving tenure rights for merit pay increases up to 130,000) teachers voted for the proposal 80%- 20%. I think this reinforces the idea that teachers want to be held accountable, and to be rewarded when they are successful. It will be interesting to see how this policy pans out and whether it can be replicated in other districts.
Actually, Rhee’s proposal was eventually accepted by teacher’s unions in D.C. You can more about it in her recent essay (co-authored with D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty) in the Wall Street Journal. Although union leaders thought teachers would reject Rhee’s proposal (which would allow individual teachers to waive their rights to tenure in exchange for a merit pay system that could reward effective teachers with salaries up to 130,000), teachers would in favor of the proposal 80% to 20%. This reinforces my belief that teachers want to be held accountable and rewarded for their work when they are successful.
Well said! My mother was an elementary school teacher and my father taught in junior and high schools until they retired, so I practically grew up surrounded by teachers and their “culture”. My parents both began their careers in education during the 1950′s when schools were better funded and less overcrowded than is frequently the case today. Yet, still they sometimes had to provide teaching materials from their own pockets. Almost every week night, and sometimes on weekends too, they labored unpaid at home to complete required paperwork,such as grading tests or projects and preparing future lesson plans. Many was the time I heard them say how unappreciated all their hard work seemed to be, how they could have made so much more money and been held in higher esteem had they gone into other fields. Being college educated in a time when that was a rarity, they could easily have done so. It took true dedication and a love of learning to be a teacher even in those “good old days”.