There were cheers all around last week from school reform opponents when "Waiting for Superman" failed to make the Oscar-nominee short list. Hard to say which was headier news to them: the Oscars snub or Schools Chancellor (and "Superman" star) Michelle Rhee getting bounced from Washington, D.C.
Justice was served, they blogged, pointing to the overblown claims in the documentary that charter schools could solve poverty, famine, global warming, fallen arches...the list goes on.
These were happy times indeed for this group, which includes everyone from teacher union officials to the liberal "common school" advocates. Their triumph arrived courtesy of a tailwind provided by the devastating movie review Diane Ravitch delivered in The New York Review of Books. She called the movie "propagandistic" and savaged director Davis Guggenheim for his "complete indifference to the wide variation among charter schools."
Wow, what a cage-fight whoopin' that was. It was easy to imagine Guggenheim begging for a tap out as Ravitch pummeled him with fact after fact showing that charter schools are no better than regular ones.
Ravitch was so right about that. Charter schools, on average, are definitely no better than regular public schools. Guggenheim naively assumed that a short disclaimer would suffice: oh by the way, not all charters achieve these results. It was something akin to those quickie car-ad disclaimers: only professional drivers should try driving 100 mph down a slick mountain course.
My advice to those cheering Guggenheim's comeuppance: Sip your victory drinks quickly, because your heady celebration lacks legs. Critics of "Superman" and Rhee overlook two realities: Rhee was trying to do exactly what this applauding crowd says they want, which is improve public schools, and those charter schools in the movie truly are that good.
Let's start with Rhee. Squint your eyes and try hard to recall the scenes from "Superman." Remember Anthony, the kid who really, really wanted to get into a charter school to avoid certain academic death at his neighborhood school, Sousa Middle School? That school is located in D.C.'s beleaguered Anacostia neighborhood.
Here's the interesting story about Sousa. Guggenheim made his documentary at a time when Sousa was most certainly an academic death trap -- dubbed an "academic sink hole" by The Washington Post. But then Michelle Rhee stepped in and appointed a kick-ass, take-names principal who, over a couple of years, refreshed the staff and turned Sousa into one of the most compelling turnaround school success stories in the nation.
And by the way, Ravitch's criticisms of charter schools warrant a school bus-size caveat. Yes, most of America's roughly 5,000 charter schools are no better than regular schools, but about 300 charters (including the ones in the movie) are not just a little better than other urban schools, but a lot better.
To suggest that those 300 charters are anything but critical education safety valves, not to mention important role models for other schools, puts you -- well -- in a Glenn Beck mindset. Different ideology, same myopia.
Still feeling good about the "Superman" snub?
Here's one more development for you to absorb. The backlash against Rhee produced a new president of the Washington Teachers Union, Nathan Saunders, who, during an interview with me for my latest book, explained that having a quality teacher isn't that important to African American students. And the new vice president of the WTU railed against the Sousa reforms in her blog, calling the principal there a "bully" for getting rid of the teachers who had made that school an academic sinkhole.
Go on, savor that victory.
Waiting For "Superman" | Trailer & Official Movie Site | Pledge Now
Waiting for 'Superman' (2010) - IMDb
Waiting for "Superman" - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Review: 'Waiting for "Superman"' Stirs Schools Debate - TIME
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/class-struggle/2011/02/michelle_rhees_early_test_scor.html
I believe Whitmire has a book about to be published on Rhee??
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/class-struggle/2011/02/rhees_response_to_bloggers_all.html
"An independent arbitrator says that the District must reinstate 75 new teachers fired by then-D.C. schools chancellor Michelle A. Rhee during their probationary period in 2008," (02/08/2011)
No wonder she's the new darling of the Neo Con-Men
Sparky Anderson, the manager of the Championship Reds and Tigers during the 70's and 80's used to always say that he, as a manager, really didn't do anything to produce winning teams. Sparky would insist that if you "give a manager some great ballplayers and they'll win every time" and that it was "the ballplayers, not the manager who wins games".
There is an analogy to be made here: If you give a mediocre manager tremendous talent, he'll win. If you give a great manager poor players, he'll lose. In both cases, the primary factor is the group you've been given to work with.
Yet, we blame "those teachers" for everything wrong with today's student outcomes.
It would be an interesting experiment to take the teachers from the Scarsdale public schools and let them changes places with the teachers from the South Bronx public schools for one full year. I'd like to see what happens.
I feel certain that there would still be as wide a gap in educational performance between the Scarsdale students and those from the South Bronx. I believe that this would be true if you had those two sets of teachers switch places for a group of kids for 13 straight years, from Kindergarten through senior year of high school.
Think about it. Do you think it's just "those teachers" that are the problem for kids in the South Bronx?
However, in all due respect, Whitmire's column here is all over the place. First he concedes that there is no statistical evidence to prove that charter schools are any better than regular public schools. But after admitting this, he goes on to say that 300 of them ARE better. Huh?
Among the regular public schools, I'm certain that there are a large number that are better than most charter schools. Does this prove anything?
Of course SOME charter schools are better than MOST regular public schools. But SOME regular public schools are better than MOST charter schools.
Why aren't the Public Schools that are performing better than most Charter Schools also "critical education safety valves, not to mention important role models for other schools"? Why not, Mr. Whitmire?
"Waiting For Superman" has a very biased, preconceived agenda. It's well-funded and has received a lot of attention. But the Academy didn't "snub" this film. The film, and its stilted, spurious viewpoint, isn't very credible, or very good filmmaking. And the Academy, to its credit, recognized this. It's as simple as that.
Are private and charter schools better? In fact, studies have shown little to no difference between public and private/charter schools. Private schools have the advantage of a few things, choice of students and the choice to send undesirable students on their way. They also have the choice to limit class sizes whereas in my school I have classes that average 40 students of types of learning styles. Seems so easy to blame teachers first and ask questions later while applauding the nice kids that come out of college to teach but only last a few years (which also allows for cheaper salaries of less experienced teachers). Rather than just fire teachers that struggle, look at the opportunity for them to develop their skills through mentoring. If they are resistant to any form of collaboration then they should be sent on their way. Do we just send out any person that struggles in a job right away? No, we do what we can to nurture them into become good at their jobs. It's just like sports, you're not perfect at the activity, you have to practice, fail, and learn from that failure.
Essentially the need to change schools is more about common sense than it is about just firing.
Davis Guggenheim, silver spoon in hand was never educated in the public school system. He was a product of Sidwell Friends and sends his children to private school. He's never experienced the real challenges that occur in the differentiated classroom. Did he bother to provide examples of schools with successful administrations and teachers? Schools are struggling because of the sensationalism of the press about the issues and problems associated with schools. Studies have shown that teachers are only the smallest part of the problem.
You describe people who celebrated the defeat of WFS as being against school reform. People in the know would say and I include myself are against educational deformers who want to privatize schools for corporate profits. They are not against true educational reform.
Likewise, I am not an education denier because I believe that standardized tests are skewed to white and middle class, that reform needs to include educators as well as those who have never taught, and that teachers and teacher unions are not all bad. Considering that Guggenheim and his children have never stepped foot into a public school, he's hardly the advocate needed.
PS. Another difference between AIT and WFS. AIT has a Nobel Prize winner speaking in favor of it; WFS has Oprah and Michelle Rhee..