There's money to be made in education, argues Bob Bowdon, therefore entirely if you cut out the unprofitable bits, like adept teachers. In his education docudrama "The Cartel," Bowdon, a TV news reporter in New Jersey, paints a terrific ugly impression of the institutional degeneracy that has resulted in very nearly unbelievable wastes of taxpayer money. The numbers reveal the tale: $17,000 spent per pupil, and at hand's but a 39% reading proficiency rate, it's hard to reason that there's a crisis afoot, but harder to agree on a solution.
On the one aspect is the monumental Jersey teachers union and shady school officials, who guarantee that, as Bowdon points out in his movie, 90 cents of every tax dollar go for other expenses, including six figure incomes for school administrators and, in a stupefying example, a school board secretary who makes $180,000. On the other side are the supporters of a charter education system, private schools in which parents can use tax vouchers to pay tuition and evade the public nightmare. One of Bowdon's principal criticisms is that an instructor, even a terrible one, essentially can't be fired -- which provides zero hustle to do much actual instruction.
"'The Cartel' examines lots of unique aspects of public education, tenure, backing, support drops, subversion --meaning thieving -- vouchers and charter schools," says Bowdon. "The label education documentary may sound to some like ho-hum squared, but in fact the picture itself betrays an fervid passion for the predicament of particularly inner-city children."
"The Cartel" first appeared on the festival circuit in summer 2009, appearing in theaters countrywide a year later. Hopefully it will get a boost, and not be overshadowed, by the more recently released docudrama "Waiting for Superman," by "An Inconvenient Truth" director Davis Guggenheim. Bowdon says the documentaries can be seen as companion pieces: his focusing on public policy and Guggenheim's taking the human-interest slant. "My picture is the left-brained edition, more analytical," Bowdon says, "'Waiting for Superman' is more the right-brained treatment."
The left-brained stance means arguments that watch the economics -- money misspent, opportunities wasted. Whilst he calls it left-brained, still "The Cartel" reaches some unhappy moments of emotion. The tearful face of a young girl who learns she was not selected for a spot at a charter school makes its own strong argument for the dissatisfactory failure of a state's education system.
And while it may be effortless to acknowledge the presence of corruption in a state so associated with organized crime, the uncomfortable fact of the matter is that this is a greatly familiar condition. Any spectator will discern the failings of their own state's education system and the fight for control. Bowdon comes out in favor of the charter school plan, of taxpayers being able to choose their own schools, to get out from under the state's control. But "The Cartel" also shows us how laborious it's going to be to get that control back from those who've found it so profitable. - 40728
On the one aspect is the monumental Jersey teachers union and shady school officials, who guarantee that, as Bowdon points out in his movie, 90 cents of every tax dollar go for other expenses, including six figure incomes for school administrators and, in a stupefying example, a school board secretary who makes $180,000. On the other side are the supporters of a charter education system, private schools in which parents can use tax vouchers to pay tuition and evade the public nightmare. One of Bowdon's principal criticisms is that an instructor, even a terrible one, essentially can't be fired -- which provides zero hustle to do much actual instruction.
"'The Cartel' examines lots of unique aspects of public education, tenure, backing, support drops, subversion --meaning thieving -- vouchers and charter schools," says Bowdon. "The label education documentary may sound to some like ho-hum squared, but in fact the picture itself betrays an fervid passion for the predicament of particularly inner-city children."
"The Cartel" first appeared on the festival circuit in summer 2009, appearing in theaters countrywide a year later. Hopefully it will get a boost, and not be overshadowed, by the more recently released docudrama "Waiting for Superman," by "An Inconvenient Truth" director Davis Guggenheim. Bowdon says the documentaries can be seen as companion pieces: his focusing on public policy and Guggenheim's taking the human-interest slant. "My picture is the left-brained edition, more analytical," Bowdon says, "'Waiting for Superman' is more the right-brained treatment."
The left-brained stance means arguments that watch the economics -- money misspent, opportunities wasted. Whilst he calls it left-brained, still "The Cartel" reaches some unhappy moments of emotion. The tearful face of a young girl who learns she was not selected for a spot at a charter school makes its own strong argument for the dissatisfactory failure of a state's education system.
And while it may be effortless to acknowledge the presence of corruption in a state so associated with organized crime, the uncomfortable fact of the matter is that this is a greatly familiar condition. Any spectator will discern the failings of their own state's education system and the fight for control. Bowdon comes out in favor of the charter school plan, of taxpayers being able to choose their own schools, to get out from under the state's control. But "The Cartel" also shows us how laborious it's going to be to get that control back from those who've found it so profitable. - 40728
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