424:. What's more, there's no breakdown of urban Jersey's demographics—the percentage of kids on school lunch aid, perhaps?—or any attempt to link classroom woes with urban problems. Yet even these gaps wouldn't have doomed the movie if Bowdon had sexed it up with a bit of old-fashioned cinematic salesmanship. The film plays more like a 90-minute TV special than a feature release. It's all talking heads, clanging music, substandard graphics, long scans of Web-page headlines and Bowdon's heavily cadenced voiceovers."
374:"an orchestrated attack against public schools and the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA)." Furthermore, the NJEA stated that Bowdon and his crew failed to identify their "true agenda" when interviewing Powell, instead questioning her under false pretenses of an "independent 'documentary on public education in New Jersey,' with a focus on No Child Left Behind, the state school funding law, and charter schools."
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through competition of resources which demands that efficiency and quality be achieved in order to thrive and attract "customers". While people commonly cite the concern that charter schools will take away funding to the detriment of the public school system, Bowden argues that they will benefit as much as anyone else from the competition and perhaps, smaller classroom sizes.
278:(NJSDA), which was responsible for the managing of construction of schools and educational infrastructure in the state allegedly didn't have any set budget, and was not monitored effectively by any other body; as a result, it is alleged that the organization "lost" between $ 500 million and $ 1 billion without a trace to poor accounting.
355:(NJ DOE) has the sole power to approve or deny charter school applicants, and in 2008, approved just one out of 22. They are not required to give applicants any reasons for denial, but applicants interviewed in the film allege that they were denied on seemingly trivial mistakes in their lengthy applications.
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to a problem rather than attempting to find and correct the problem directly. The administrative inefficiency present in New Jersey is highlighted by Bowden's comparison of the state's educational system to that of another state that Bowden explains is chosen because it is nearby and similarly populated,
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Bowden also notes examples of charters that don't outperform district schools in their same area, like the Hope
Academy, which scored far lower in language arts and math proficiency (27.8 to 21.4% in language arts, 19.6 to 14.3% in math), but says that parents will often still prefer charters, simply
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wrote, "Bowdon would have something if he scaled back the outrage and analyzed the causes of these practices and, ultimately, why so many children around the country aren’t being properly taught. Instead the filmmaker tries to position New Jersey as a microcosm of
America and turns “The Cartel” into
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wrote, "as is the wont of certain TV news reporting, his approach pre-chews every detail, lest we fail to understand it. He’s smart. We’re dumb. Let the animated inserts explain the facts." He added, "it’s a testament to how fascinatingly bad things are for our public schools that 'The Cartel' is as
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The film highlights the problem of waste and corruption in the New Jersey public school system that Bowdon claims is rampant in districts throughout the country. He chooses the New Jersey area as it serves as an example of what can happen when problems are addressed by allocating more budget money
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Bowdon said that the NJEA invented the fact that the film had had any financial support before it was completely finished, and that his partnerships and financial support were all post production. He said that rather than addressing any of the film's substantive arguments, they focused instead on
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During her interview, the head of the New Jersey
Education Association (NJEA) Joyce Powell responded to criticisms of the tenure process: when presented with a statistic that only 0.03% of tenured teachers are removed from the classroom, she suggested that this was true because 99.97% are "doing a
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The street interviews Bowden conducted indicate that people invariably support the increased funding of schools under the understanding that increased funding will improve the quality of education in the United States; Bowden, on the other hand, argues that efficiency and quality is best achieved
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Another major problem with the public school system according to Bowden is the difficulty with firing tenured teachers, seemingly no matter how bad they are. Rules originally put in place by the teacher's unions to protect teachers, he argues, have come to hinder fairness and accountability and
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in the United States by focusing on New Jersey, which has the highest level of per-student education spending in the U.S. According to The
Internet Movie Database (IMDb), the film asks: "How has the richest and most innovative society on earth suddenly lost the ability to teach its children at a
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which compete for students and government funding with public schools will have the effect of improving quality and efficiency across the board. Students at charter schools have been shown to frequently perform better than their counterparts in the same areas; some assume that this is the case
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Kevin Thomas calls the film a "brisk, incisive and mind-boggling—no other phrase will work—exposé of his native New Jersey's public education system," saying that "Bowdon moves beyond statistics to discover how the sorry condition of his state's public schools came to be."
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on May 30, 2009, and was awarded "Best of the
Festival (Audience Award)". It opened in New York City and Los Angeles on April 16, 2010, Houston on April 23 and in Denver, Minneapolis, Boston, Washington D.C., St. Louis, San Francisco, Philadelphia and Chicago on April 30.
463:, which came out after he was already governor. In another interview, he said that the film was "extraordinarily important" in that it tells a story about what is going on in the New Jersey public school system that "needs to be told."
457:, who came into office in 2010, saw the movie before being elected, and said that it "helped to mold for me the final outlines of what I wanted to do if I were lucky enough to become governor." He praised that documentary, as well as
285:, which he describes as one of the many under-performing schools in the state, which spent 6 million dollars on constructing a brand new "state of the art" football field, rather than spending the same money to improve academics.
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During 2008 budget crisis, while many other departments were "on the chopping block" (proposed budget had 4B in cuts), the teacher's union successfully lobbied for a 5% increase in education spending.
319:, select students by random lottery, often with incoming students who perform slightly lower than the district average. North Star, as an example, spends 25% less per student, even without the large
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The film credits include the reminder, "There are good teachers in the worst schools. There are good administrators in the worst districts. Support them! (While you fight The Cartel).
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to get their children out of dangerous situations that exist in the public schools. One Hope
Academy student describes his old school as being "just like" the school in the film
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high school teacher in
California who taught for seventeen years, relying upon the help of "student aides" to do the necessary in-class reading and writing for him.
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Bowdon interviewed "school administrators, teachers, parents, students and education advocates" for the film. Among the interviews are State
Education Commissioner
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Construction costs and related corruption also represent a major cost according to Bowden. The New Jersey School
Construction Corporation (SCC), now known as the
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at a far lower cost per student: 88.4% to 49.9% in language arts; 93.0% to 35.3% in math; with $ 10,994 versus $ 17,237 of spending per student, respectively.
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as the cause of the problems (they are "the cartel" of the title), due to, among other things, the obstacles they put in place to firing bad teachers, through
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personal attacks at him. He also said, "It's more than a little ironic that the NJEA criticized me for lack of transparency through an anonymous author."
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will revitalize the school system, leading to improved efficiency and performance in all schools, both district and charter.
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709:"Capsule Movie Reviews: 'The Cartel' examines a state falling down on the job in educating its children"
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As a counterpoint to all of these types of problems, Bowden suggests that the increased prevalence of
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to focus on the project, and spent two years on it. The film's post production was aided by the
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Perhaps the most major hindrance to the creation of charter schools, he suggests, is that the
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achieved far higher proficiency rates than students in the Newark
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actually hurt good teachers by keeping bad ones in place. He cites as one example an
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because they admit better-performing students to begin with, but many, like the
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This article is about the documentary film. For the record distributor, see
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level that other modern countries consider 'basic'?" The film regards
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484:"Пин ап казино играть на деньги на официальном сайте Pin up Casino"
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525:"N.J. Educational system examined in documentary 'The Cartel'"
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Chris Christie Comments on The Cartel Movie -- Extended Cut
625:"The Cartel: A digestible lesson in public-school failures"
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good job," saying "I think 99.97% should be celebrated."
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Documentary films about education in the United States
644:"'The Cartel' sees teacher unions' grip as crippling"
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642:MacQuarrie, Brian (April 25, 2010).
543:hobokeninternationalfilmfestival.com
328:Robert Treat Academy Charter School
206:Hoboken International Film Festival
22:The Cartel (professional wrestling)
834:English-language documentary films
353:New Jersey Department of Education
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669:Biancolli, Amy (April 30, 2010).
623:Morris, Wesley (April 30, 2010).
317:North Star Academy Charter School
243:), Gerard Robinson (president of
707:Thomas, Kevin (April 16, 2010).
612:New Jersey Education Association
215:is Bowdon's first film; he left
197:, suggesting that the increased
18:The Cartel (record distributor)
306:Performance of charter schools
20:. For the wrestler group, see
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688:Pais, Matt (April 29, 2010).
283:Malcolm X Shabazz High School
189:. It also makes the case for
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323:of the large district.
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460:Waiting for "Superman"
100:Bowdon Media with the
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414:Amy Biancolli of the
400:watchable as it is."
239:(former president of
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453:New Jersey Governor
422:No Child Left Behind
259:Administrative waste
217:Bloomberg Television
326:8th graders of the
650:. the Boston Globe
506:. October 9, 2009.
321:economies of scale
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694:Metromix New York
486:. August 4, 2021.
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778:Categories
764:The Cartel
648:Boston.com
467:References
409:The Cartel
383:The Cartel
372:The Cartel
348:came in."
344:, "before
341:Lean on Me
296:illiterate
213:The Cartel
174:New Jersey
165:is a 2009
162:The Cartel
138:90 minutes
125: (USA)
121:2009-10-09
93:Production
73:Jen Wekelo
65:Bob Bowdon
62:Written by
56:Bob Bowdon
35:The Cartel
718:August 6,
654:August 6,
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563:August 5,
389:Reception
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78:Edited by
429:Metromix
266:Maryland
167:American
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539:"Home"
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