It is an anti- union documentary movie with a controversial view that centers on children's lives and opportunities being wasted. The Garden State is being singled out because its high education budget contrasts with its monumental dropout record and its student's awfully dismal scores in national achievement tests.
However, there is a growing group of people who argue that there is so much room for improvement in the country's educational system without increasing the budget. A Former TV reporter and current movie director for one, believes that the school system is much to blame for most of its woes. A former school superintendent that he interviewed for his movie believes that the widespread, persistent and institutionalized dishonesty in the preparation and implementation of the educational budget as the foremost problem. He also blames the profoundly deep-rooted, self-serving teacher's union as the one responsible for the country's twisted educational system.
Proponents of the theory claims that the budget that the state provides is being mismanaged and blames institutionalized fraud in preparing and implementing the budget. He also accuses the teacher's union of protecting only the interest of its members while putting the welfare of the students behind. The tenure provision in particular is being cited as a self-serving rule that protects poor and unqualified teachers from dismissal.
The director used his experience as a TV reporter and anchorman to the hilt, by using talking heads, street ambush interviews, special effects, stilted B-roll and finally his factual, albeit one sided condemnation of the voucher program, the tenure system and the secretive nature of schools. He was successful in overcoming deficiencies in style and construction with selective but factual content.
Scenes of a school district president riding in a limousine car or a luxury car packed school parking lot is a little bit over the top, but his skills in making documentaries is manifested by the logic that he used to present his argument on the needed reforms.
Critics are quick to counter that the movie contradicts its basic claim that reforms can be made without changing the total amount of the budget. High performing elite urban schools have a high per-head budget. Only the cash strapped religious charter schools can afford to run in the current budget. Implementing the proposed solution of tapping chartered schools will only drive students to the church basements or rented spaces of religious schools. They also predict that the voucher system, with additional funds from the parents will only be able to enroll the students in more expensive private schools who only have the same test ratings as the traditional schools that they came from in the first place.
Teacher's Union and the tenure process are both being blamed for the shortage of qualified teachers. Teachers unions want to make sure that they have a steady job for life and protect its members from dismissal from service including the bad ones. However, teacher's union officials dispute the claim, arguing that tenure is meant to protect teachers from the whims and caprices of the school administration and politicians. They claim there are enough ways to remove poor teachers from the schools.
New Jersey school officials and other opponents of the theory argue that the documentary focused only on a few extreme examples and does not represent the true nature of the country's educational condition in general and the New Jersey educational system in particular. Sadly, the true state affairs could be somewhere in between and the real solution is too important to be left to movie directors and politicians to decide.
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