The education method in America is working superbly, says Bob Bowdon, but only for a few -- and those few surely aren't the students. In his education docudrama "The Cartel," Bowdon, a TV news reporter in New Jersey, paints a notable ugly impression of the institutional corruption that has resulted in very nearly incredible wastes of taxpayer money. It's not toilsome for Bowdon to exemplify that something's execrably amiss with a state that pays $17,000 per student but can only manage a 39% reading proficiency rate -- that there's a crisis is undeniable, how to deal with it is another question entirely.
Present are two major factions in Bowdon's film -- the villains are reasonably clearly the Jersey teachers union and school board who funnel 90 cents of every dollar away from teachers' salaries and towards incidentals, including six-figure salaries for school administrators. 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 shake off the public nightmare. Bowdon makes much of the fact that it's practically impossible for an instructor to be fired, a safety net that does little to incite hard work in those teachers who discern they hold a vocation regardless of how many of the three Rs they instruct -- if any.
From the Heart and Mind
"The film examines lots of diverse aspects of public teaching, tenure, financing, patronage drops, corruption --meaning theft -- vouchers and charter schools," says Bowdon. "The idiom education documentary possibly could sound to some like boring squared, but in fact the movie itself betrays an fiery passion for the plight of particularly inner-city children."
The documentary first appeared on the festival circuit in summer 2009, appearing in theaters nationally a year later. Hopefully it will get a rise, and not be overshadowed, by the more recently released documental "Waiting for Superman," by "An Inconvenient Truth" director Davis Guggenheim. Bowdon sees the two documentaries as taking alternative approaches to the equal problem, "The Cartel" by examining public policy and "Superman" focusing on the human-interest aspects. "My movie is the left-brained version, more analytical," Bowdon says, "'Waiting for Superman' is more the right-brained treatment."
A Battle for Control
It is undoubtedly analytical, couching its arguments in an assessment of how the money is being spent, or misspent. Though he calls it left-brained, still the movie reaches some heartbreaking moments of emotion. A girl's tears upon hearing that she wasn't selected to attend a charter school, that she's stuck in her public school, portray the failure of a system as well as Bowdon's charts and interviews.
And though there's a satire in this kind of public depravation happening in a state notable for its organized crime, it's unambiguous that this is not an isolated collapse. Any spectator will acknowledge the failings of their own state's education system and the battle for control. The one he seems to be most behind is the charter schools, which take the reins from the unions and give them back to the taxpayer. But he also knows it'll be an upward struggle to regain control from those who've worked so hard to make education very profitable for the very few.
Present are two major factions in Bowdon's film -- the villains are reasonably clearly the Jersey teachers union and school board who funnel 90 cents of every dollar away from teachers' salaries and towards incidentals, including six-figure salaries for school administrators. 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 shake off the public nightmare. Bowdon makes much of the fact that it's practically impossible for an instructor to be fired, a safety net that does little to incite hard work in those teachers who discern they hold a vocation regardless of how many of the three Rs they instruct -- if any.
From the Heart and Mind
"The film examines lots of diverse aspects of public teaching, tenure, financing, patronage drops, corruption --meaning theft -- vouchers and charter schools," says Bowdon. "The idiom education documentary possibly could sound to some like boring squared, but in fact the movie itself betrays an fiery passion for the plight of particularly inner-city children."
The documentary first appeared on the festival circuit in summer 2009, appearing in theaters nationally a year later. Hopefully it will get a rise, and not be overshadowed, by the more recently released documental "Waiting for Superman," by "An Inconvenient Truth" director Davis Guggenheim. Bowdon sees the two documentaries as taking alternative approaches to the equal problem, "The Cartel" by examining public policy and "Superman" focusing on the human-interest aspects. "My movie is the left-brained version, more analytical," Bowdon says, "'Waiting for Superman' is more the right-brained treatment."
A Battle for Control
It is undoubtedly analytical, couching its arguments in an assessment of how the money is being spent, or misspent. Though he calls it left-brained, still the movie reaches some heartbreaking moments of emotion. A girl's tears upon hearing that she wasn't selected to attend a charter school, that she's stuck in her public school, portray the failure of a system as well as Bowdon's charts and interviews.
And though there's a satire in this kind of public depravation happening in a state notable for its organized crime, it's unambiguous that this is not an isolated collapse. Any spectator will acknowledge the failings of their own state's education system and the battle for control. The one he seems to be most behind is the charter schools, which take the reins from the unions and give them back to the taxpayer. But he also knows it'll be an upward struggle to regain control from those who've worked so hard to make education very profitable for the very few.
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