The school system could be made to be overly profitable, says Bob Bowdon, although exclusively at the expense of things like teachers and students. In his docudrama "The Cartel," New Jersey TV news reporter Bowdon shines a light on the depravity and greed that has resulted in the disappearance of so much taxpayer money in that state. The numbers tell the tale: $17,000 exhausted per student, and there's but a 39% reading proficiency rate, it's tough to argue that there's a crisis afoot, but harder to agree on a solution.
The two sides of this conflict meet head-on in interviews throughout Bowdon's picture: there are the teachers union and school board members who have managed to apportion 90 cents of every taxpayer dollar into everything but teachers' salaries -- though a number of school administrators make upwards of $100,000. The other faction are the supporters of charter schools, the private schools that can elude the influence of the public school system and would assist inner-city kids if their taxpayer money could be more sagely used. Bowdon makes much of the fact that it's just about impossible for an instructor to be fired, a safety net that does little to boost hard work in those teachers who acknowledge they possess a career irrespective of how many of the three Rs they instruct -- if any.
"'The Cartel' examines lots of distinctive aspects of public education, tenure, backing, patronage drops, subversion --meaning thieving -- vouchers and charter schools," says Bowdon. "The title education documentary may sound to some like boring squared, but in fact the movie itself betrays an ardent passion for the quandary 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 documental "Waiting for Superman," by "An Inconvenient Truth" director Davis Guggenheim. Bowdon sees the films as complementary, and hopes that "Superman," with its human-interest stance, draws more notice to his own, which focuses on public policy. "My movie is the left-brained edition, more analytical," Bowdon says, "'Waiting for Superman' is more the right-brained treatment."
And Bowdon's film is relentlessly critical, making a potent case for the view that the quantity of money spent is nowhere near as eminent as how it is spent. But that isn't to say the film is without heart. Bowdon makes sure his eye is continually on the people affected, particularly the inner-city students trapped in a disordered system. The tearful face of a young girl who learns she was not selected for a spot at a charter school makes its own intense argument for the dissatisfactory failure of a state's education system.
And although it may be effortless to admit the presence of corruption in a state so associated with organized crime, the uncomfortable fact of the subject is that this is a greatly familiar situation. Bowdon's film illustrates a local difficulty, but any watcher will realize the systems of system failure in their own state's schools. 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. Nevertheless he also knows it'll be an uphill conflict to recover control from those who've worked so hard to make education very profitable for the very few. - 40731
The two sides of this conflict meet head-on in interviews throughout Bowdon's picture: there are the teachers union and school board members who have managed to apportion 90 cents of every taxpayer dollar into everything but teachers' salaries -- though a number of school administrators make upwards of $100,000. The other faction are the supporters of charter schools, the private schools that can elude the influence of the public school system and would assist inner-city kids if their taxpayer money could be more sagely used. Bowdon makes much of the fact that it's just about impossible for an instructor to be fired, a safety net that does little to boost hard work in those teachers who acknowledge they possess a career irrespective of how many of the three Rs they instruct -- if any.
"'The Cartel' examines lots of distinctive aspects of public education, tenure, backing, patronage drops, subversion --meaning thieving -- vouchers and charter schools," says Bowdon. "The title education documentary may sound to some like boring squared, but in fact the movie itself betrays an ardent passion for the quandary 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 documental "Waiting for Superman," by "An Inconvenient Truth" director Davis Guggenheim. Bowdon sees the films as complementary, and hopes that "Superman," with its human-interest stance, draws more notice to his own, which focuses on public policy. "My movie is the left-brained edition, more analytical," Bowdon says, "'Waiting for Superman' is more the right-brained treatment."
And Bowdon's film is relentlessly critical, making a potent case for the view that the quantity of money spent is nowhere near as eminent as how it is spent. But that isn't to say the film is without heart. Bowdon makes sure his eye is continually on the people affected, particularly the inner-city students trapped in a disordered system. The tearful face of a young girl who learns she was not selected for a spot at a charter school makes its own intense argument for the dissatisfactory failure of a state's education system.
And although it may be effortless to admit the presence of corruption in a state so associated with organized crime, the uncomfortable fact of the subject is that this is a greatly familiar situation. Bowdon's film illustrates a local difficulty, but any watcher will realize the systems of system failure in their own state's schools. 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. Nevertheless he also knows it'll be an uphill conflict to recover control from those who've worked so hard to make education very profitable for the very few. - 40731
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