I went to see "Waiting for Superman" today and I have to say that as an educator (and a mom) it was very scary and very inspiring. Scary in that my kids are going to be a product of the American school system. Inspiring in that I am an educator and I can make it better (in my own little piece of the world). I wish the movie had talked a bit more about the middle class (although I know that would not have been as much of an attention getter).
They did talk a little about one child that wanted to get into a charter high school (and she did). I have to admit that I love the idea of Charter schools. We just recently moved and my oldest son currently goes to our local public school because it is a good one, but when we lived in the city I was on the founders committee to one of Baltimore's first charter schools. I am very proud of that school and all of the work that has gone into making it what it is. There are times that I still wish we lived in the neighborhood, so my boys could go to such a diverse and committed school.
I love the idea that parent's have such an invested stake in what goes on in the school. Not that my son's current local school doesn't, because it does. It also has parent volunteers like crazy. My son's class has a volunteer every day of the week for the next two months (and I am only in there once every other week). If I had that many volunteers when I was teaching I would have been doing backflips!
Anyway, if you are invested in your child's future (and I know we all are) you should see this movie. It is an eye opener, even if it is a bit of a downer at some points (you want it to all be okay for everyone & it's not).
No comments:
Post a Comment