Can a feature-length movie help promote the reform of our schools? That is the obvious question being raised by many who have seen Won't Back Down, the new film being released nationwide this week. The movie, which was inspired by the California parent trigger law, stars award-winning actresses Viola Davis and Maggie Gyllenhaal as a teacher and parent who come together to take over their failing public school. The parent trigger law was enacted in late 2010 and allows parents with kids in a failing school to force the local school district to replace the school's leadership, if 51 percent of those parents sign a petition calling for the change. The movie takes that theme and adds another component that includes teachers as part of the petition process. So, as the movie plot develops, low-income parent Gyllenhaal coaxes teacher Davis into agreeing to the idea of starting a new school and, in turn, they both then must get signatures from 51 percent of both the parents and teachers at the school.Â
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Unlike the recent documentaries that have dealt with the failings of our schools, Won't Back Down does more than just showcase the challenges found in our school system --Â it also entertains. A buzz about acting nominations for Gyllenhaal and Davis has already begun. There is no doubt that millions of Americans will see the movie and become aware of the complex school reform issues that many of us have tried to highlight for years.
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But the real benefit of the movie for everyday Americans is that it clearly demonstrates the power of parents in the school choice movement. As local school districts inch toward reform, sometimes at a snail's pace, legions of parents, from all walks of life, are asserting themselves more and demanding more from their schools and for their child's education. In fact, that demand led to the original parent trigger law.
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As a growing number of states consider their own version of the law, pockets of parent empowerment groups are placing increased pressure on their elected leaders for more charter schools, opportunity scholarships and other quality educational options. The education reform movement is now in full bloom because parents, like Gyllenhaal's character in the movie, are becoming more engaged and determined to fight for change for their kids.
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As a poor, uneducated single mother in a working class Pittsburg neighborhood, Gyllenhaal's dogged desire for a better future for her daughter fuels the entire movie. Though uneducated, she clearly knows that education is the great equalizer, and she will not give up! Her character reminded me of so many parents that I have met who possess that same dogged determination and hope for their children's future.
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With all due respect to the education reformers and elected leaders who have been fighting for change, it is these parents who will ultimately pave the way for quicker reforms and improved schools nationwide. You see, for parents, a quality education for  their kids is personal. And our tedious approach to reform is only increasing their numbers. That's bad news for those who continue to support the status quo, because these parents won't back down.
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Julie Cavanagh: The Truth Behind Won't Back Down
Crystal Brown: What Is a Parent Supposed to Do?
Mary Bottari: 'Won't Back Down' Film Pushes ALEC Parent Trigger Proposal
Secondly, what has evolved from the school choice political movement is the new segregation. THose students lucky enough to have involved parents get to choose, the rest are still pushed into the street. What those who do get to choose achieve is not better schools but simply schools that are absent the students who need us the most. This leaves higher scoring students and better behaved students in their elite school. And the segregation continues in a slightly different manner.
The end result, The same kids are pushed into the street, and the subclass is maintained. And for that we are proud?.
What's really frustrating is that there is a reform known to provide immense benefits: universal pre-school and kindergarten. If only reformers would get behind it.
* empower teachers, support their unions
* provide effective professional development
* foster collaboration and a spirit of inquiry
* provide meaningful evaluations and supportÂ
* only grant tenure to qualified teachers
* offer mentoring
* make principals accountable
Additionally, increase resources in schools which service low-income students. Universal, quality preschool, support services for families (job training, ELL, parenting classes, health services, crisis intervention, and community support), putting the most skilled teachers in classrooms with at-risk students, and case management to track each student will together, bring our education levels to world class ranking.
For example: What if there are great teachers, but also really harmful, crummy ones and the union is backing the crummy ones? What if the district provides professional development, but for methodologies that don't have a track record of working with the target population? What if everyone at the school (except parents) really likes the status quo? What if everyone says that the reason the students can't learn is because they are poor? What if everyone says that it's all the parents' fault for producing low achieving kids and raising them in a culture of poverty?
I think your ideas are really good, but it will require some agreement on how to tell if things are working. It will probably require a high level alliance between parents and teachers that will allow teachers unions to move poor and harmful teachers out or improve them more quickly as well as changes in practices around seniority. It will probably require building and sustaining a movement to invest more taxpayer money in education. It will probably require changes in teacher college curriculum, in making school funding more equitable,
They weren't fighting against nobody. The school district was inflexible, there were political struggles within the teachers union over racist teachers opposing the hiring of bi-lingual teachers. The parents finally won and the district was ordered to desegregate but in the meantime, generations of students were deprived of a decent education. The parent trigger (and charter school laws) were inspired by terrible situations like this.
A propaganda piece with blame on its mind.
Andrew O’Hehir, Salon.com
Inept and bizarre ... a set of right-wing anti-union talking points disguised (with very limited success) as a mainstream motion-picture-type product.
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
A film where typecasting and color-coding makes it easy to predict which characters are good or bad.
Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News
The plot is just a clothesline on which to hang an unabashedly biased diatribe.
David Germain, Associated Press
"Won't Back Down" lives down to its bland, us-against-them title with a simple-minded assault on the ills of public schools that lumbers along like a math class droning multiplication tables.
Peter Debruge, Variety
Grossly oversimplifying the issue at hand, writer-director Daniel Barnz's disingenuous pot-stirrer plays to audiences' emotions rather than their intelligence.
Melissa Anderson, Village Voice
In Davis's case, marveling at yet another fine performance doesn't stop you from wishing that her first leading role was in a worthier vehicle.
Barbara VanDenburgh, Arizona Republ ic:
It's rich territory for human drama; unfortunately, the film is more interested in slapping a charter-school Band-Aid on the gushing wound than exploring dramatic possibilities.
David Rooney, Hollywood Reporter
The hot-button issue of public school reform gets unsubtle treatment in this pedestrian and insultingly tendentious drama.
Stephanie Zacharek, Film.com
It's terrible when schools fail our children. But it's not so great when movies fail their actors, either.
Now as for three actresses who starred in propoganda they should be ashamed-taking money to destroy public education.
http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2012/09/critics-pan-wont-back-down-as-badly.html
Even movie reviewers who have no skin in the ed reform game -- and who don't know a thing about how the despicable ALEC is involved with pushing Parent Trigger bills -- can tell that this film is a bunch of propaganda crap.