ScreenFish

where faith and film are intertwined

education

Back to School Catch-Up Catch-All

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Back to school time is always busy and full of new beginnings. In this new episode of the Your Sunday Drive podcast, we get together (for the first episode since June!) to catch up and have a catch-all conversation about all things related to this time of year.

In the end, we reflect on how easy it is to be anxious at times like these… and how good it is to be able to cast our anxieties on God.

Note: When we say catch all, we mean catch all 🙂 Topics include: What’s new at the Church in Drive, cancel culture, book bans, education in general, sharing back-to-school photos on Facebook, how we create community even when it’s more challenging, how college kids are still kids, how there’s a sweet-spot agewise for politicians, the Forward party, avoiding the ditches of extremes, Randal Rauser and Progressive Christians Love Jesus Too, grammar quibbles and the constructedness of language, the new football season and the Big 10 going “coast to coast” (like Space Ghost), 1177 B.C., The Old Man, Better Call Saul, Nope, Everything Everywhere All at Once, chilling and doing bird stuff, etc. etc.

Come along for Your Sunday Drive – quick conversation about current events, politics, pop culture and more, from the perspective of a couple of guys trying to follow Jesus.

Hosts: Matt Hill and Nate Polzin. Presented by the Church in Drive of Saginaw, MI, as often as possible. Please visit churchindrive.com and facebook.com/thechurchindrive

My Name Is Pedro – Teaching and Politics

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A gifted educator can often make an important difference in the lives of students. My Name Is Pedro, from documentarian Lillian LaSalle, is the story of a charismatic school administrator who managed to turn around struggling schools through his belief in and interaction with students and teachers.

Pedro Santiago grew up in the Bronx. He wasn’t an exemplary student, but as is often the case, a teacher believed in him enough for him to believe in himself. After college and a stint in Africa with the Peace Corps, Santiago began teaching in his old community. He rose to the position of Principal and took on a failing middle school. Soon the metrics for the school were showing vast improvement—enough that he was profiled in the New York Times. He was then hired as Assistant Superintendent by a struggling suburban school district.

His tenure in that district turned out to be problematic, mostly because of the political setting. The East Ramapo School District is one of the few districts in which more students are in private schools than public schools, largely because of a large Hasidic community who teach their children in Yeshivas. When Hasidim became the majority of the school board, budgets and programs were cut. In time it led to changes in the administration and Santiago’s termination, in spite of great community support for him.

In reality, there are two documentaries here. The first a personal profile of an educator. Santiago is a worthy subject for times when public schools are often seen as failing. He is evidence that it is possible for even schools with a history of problems to become successful. The parts of his life we’re shown are inspiring, but it is obvious that there are parts he’s not sharing with us. For example, we see only hints of his family life—enough to raise questions that aren’t answered. We see bits of his method of working in schools, but not enough to really have a feel that his methods could be more broadly applied, or are they site specific?

The second documentary is about the school district. The dynamics of the board meetings we attend seem to be an example of civic dysfunction. Viewers are left to wonder how things could have gotten to the point where people not invested in public education are running a school district. (This concept comes up again at the ending when there are clips of Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, who has not attended, sent her children to, or taught in a public school, yet is in charge of federal government education policy.)

Neither of these possible documentaries are fully developed. We may find inspiration in Santiago’s story, but we never get deep enough into the subject. Watching the politics of the school board just leaves us shaking our heads in disbelief at their cavalier attitude toward the public, and wondering about the politicization of education.

My Name is Pedro is available via Virtual Cinema through local arthouses.

Photos courtesy of Sweet 180.

Black Boys – The Two-edged Sword

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“The bottom line for why things haven’t changed is there is no love for black boys.”

Sonia Lowman’s documentary Black Boys opens with former NFLer Greg Scruggs reading The Little Engine that Could to his toddler son. It transitions to a middle school age boy taking Richard Wrights Black Boy from a shelf and reading it. That dichotomy of idealism and reality is the driving force of the film. Or as activist/rapper Malcolm Little puts it, “You’re talking a double-edged sword to be a black boy in America, because you have to tell yourself that you are magnificent and that you are free and beautiful, while simultaneously acknowledging that the world is not built for you. It’s not built for your success. It’s not built for you to survive.”

The film is designed in four sections entitled Body, Mind, Voice, and Heart. In each of those we get a touch of what it means for young black men as they grow into the world. Sports dominates the Body section. Sports may seem like a way out of the difficulties blacks face, but is it? Or is it just another exploitation of black bodies? Education becomes the main topic of the Mind section. Again, this is an area of great hope, but we also know that as early as kindergarten, black children are often getting less attention and are sold lower expectations. The Voice and Heart sections really focus more on the hopeful side of the film’s core contrast to let us hear what the experience has done to the people interviewed and how the future has an opportunity for change, but that is by no means a certainty.

I consider myself woke (at least for an old white guy), so there isn’t much in this film that is new to me. But it is a very powerful presentation of not just facts and figures, but of the emotional reality of the lives of the people we visit. This is in no small part because of the excellent work Lowman has done in interviewing her subjects to evoke their reflections. Whether the subjects are athletes, educators, activists, or young people looking at their future, the insights provided are always challenging without being overly judgmental. As a white person watching the film I didn’t feel as though I was being called on to feel guilty, but to be engaged with the issues of social justice that are brought forth.

One piece of archival footage that spoke to me, personally, was a press conference held by Philadelphia Eagle player Malcolm Jenkins in which he never spoke, only held up prepared signs. Several of the signs repeated the sentence, “You aren’t listening”. To me that is a reminder that the first (but not the last) thing I need to do when faced with the cries for social justice, is to listen. I may have heard these things before. I still need to listen again.

Black Boys is an invitation for all of us to listen. Some of us need to hear the facts and figures we may have missed. Some of us may need to hear the pain some people have lived through. Some of us may need to hear of the inequalities we never knew about. Some of us may need to hear the visions of hope that continue to be dreamed—and realized. Listen.

Black Boys is available on NBCUniversal’s Peacock streaming service.

Science Fair: The Future Starting Now

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Every year millions of students take part in science fairs. The projects may involve fairly simple ideas, or they may be world changing. Science Fair is about those that are head and shoulders above the average science project. It looks at some of the projects that made it to the International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF). All the projects we see are the kind of things we think should be going on in corporate or university research facilities, but it is being done by high school kids—very amazing high school kids.

Students entering International Science and Engineering Fair at the Los Angeles Convention Center. (Univision)

Co-director Cristina Constantini went to ISEF twice in high school (getting a 4th place as a freshman). That experience allows her to show us this world without it seeming as nerdy as we might think. She introduces us to a number of students—and one amazing teacher—as they seek to change the world through their projects. Among these are Kashfia, a Muslim girl at a high school in South Dakota, who is working on technology to help us understand addiction; Mylenna and Gabriel, two students from a very poor state in Brazil, who are working to develop a treatment to stop the Zika virus which is prevalent where they live; Ryan Harsha, and Abraham, from Kentucky, who brought their different skill sets to design an electronic stethoscope for better diagnoses; and Dr. Serena McCalla, a teacher who has nine students qualify for ISEF (while most schools are justifiably thrilled to have even one). There are others as well who each has their own story.

There is a good deal of contrast between the students we meet. Some come from schools that have strong programs in support of science competition; others come from places that don’t even seem to notice. Kashfia, for example, comes from a school that has lots of trophies from their sports teams, but no one has ever acknowledged the second place award she won the year before. And when she couldn’t find anyone else to serve as her advisor, the football coach stepped up because of the potential he saw in her.

In design this film is very much like other documentaries about students that excel at something, such as Spellbound, which followed contestants at the National Spelling Bee. The difference is that these students are much more multi-dimensional. Their intelligence expresses itself in various ways. And they are not just looking to win (although they clearly are), they are seeking to make a difference in the world. Some of their projects have the potential of saving many lives. Some take existing technology to a new level. It is not hyperbole to  say these students are revolutionizing their fields. And they continue to try to do even more than they have already.

It reminds us that the foundations of the future include the education of future generations. And in the cases of these students, that foundation is already being built upon.

Photos courtesy of Univision and National Geographic