Summary: Presents the theory that the American dream, all but abandoned in the United States, has been adopted successfully in other countries, including Italy, France, Finland, Slovenia, Germany, Portugal, Norway, Tunisia, and Iceland, looking at such areas as worker benefits, public expenditure for the common good, and state-funded higher education.
Format: moving image
Publisher / Publication Date: Anchor Bay Entertainment 2016
Copies Available at Woodmere
3 available in Documentary DVDs, Call number: DVD DOC WHESummary: Do American schools adequately prepare students to take part in society? Can a complacent, ill-informed public trace its problems back to the nation's classrooms? This program examines the impact of the No Child Left Behind Act on the ability of public education to involve students in civic and governmental processes. Filmed in economically and culturally diverse schools, the program includes...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: Are advocates of the intelligent design theory really creationists in disguise? To what extent has the I.D. argument widened America's cultural divide? And if a clear winner emerges, who loses? This program thoroughly examines those questions, describing the theory's quasi-scientific origins and documenting the Pennsylvania court battle over teaching I.D. in biology classes. A historical...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Confronting one of the most complex and potentially divisive issues on the American cultural landscape, this ABC News program examines the intellectual and political forces that support the teaching of intelligent design in public schools. The video focuses on the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank that has generated widespread enthusiasm-and criticism-for making I.D. part of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In 1900, 6% of America's children graduated from high school; by 1945, 51% graduated and 40% went on to college. This program recalls how massive immigration, child labor laws, and the explosive growth of cities fueled school attendance and transformed public education. Also explored are the impact of John Dewey's progressive ideas as well as the effects on students of controversial IQ tests,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Myths, misconceptions, and the march of time have obscured the true origins and legal details of Brown v. The Board of Education. This fascinating program connects viewers with the people, places, events, and ideas that shaped the landmark civil rights case. Interviewees include Cheryl Brown Henderson, daughter of lead plaintiff Oliver Brown; Zelma Henderson, who, until her death in 2008, was...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Sixteen students search for knowledge, fun, love, sex, and a path to a rewarding career as this documentary tracks them through one academic year at The University of British Columbia. Partying, clubs, and sports compete head-to-head with classes and sleep-but campus life is only one part of this compelling story. The other revolves around that age-old transition from child to adult known...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: Why don't we get the best out of people? Author/educator Sir Ken Robinson argues that it's because we've been educated to become good workers instead of creative thinkers. In this TEDTalk, Robinson makes an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that cultivates creativity and acknowledges multiple types of intelligence. An excellent discussion-starter in the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In 1983, the Reagan Administration's report, A Nation at Risk, shattered public confidence in America's school system and sparked a new wave of education reform. This program explores the impact of the "free market" experiments that ensued, from vouchers and charter schools to privatization-all with the goal of meeting tough new academic standards. Today, the debate rages on: do these diverse...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Plato's academy was the first formal arena for education, where young men were tutored in the rigors of logic, philosophy, and mathematics. Prior to this, societies transmitted knowledge from one generation to the next orally, and after the advent of writing, through texts. Although education throughout history has been predominantly a privilege of the elite, universal education is currently...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: A follow up to Democracy Left Behind: NCLB and Civic Education (item 39484), this program looks at community-based learning in K-12 education. The film explores a wide variety of educational settings in which action-oriented lessons enable students to work outside the classroom, in their own communities. While taking nothing away from the importance of traditional academic subjects, the film...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2011
View online at AVOD
Summary: KIPP, the Knowledge Is Power Program, is a network of free open-enrollment college-preparatory public schools in under-resourced communities throughout the United States. In this interview, KIPP co-developer Michael Feinberg joins Hedrick Smith to discuss the program-a reform initiative created as a model for middle school reform, starting in fifth grade. The purpose of KIPP? "To provide kids...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In segment one of this interview, Kati Haycock, founder and director of The Education Trust, and Hedrick Smith discuss a range of hot topics in contemporary education: the standards movement and educational equity, No Child Left Behind, and the critical components of effective school reform, to name only three. In segment two, Mike Casserly, Ph.D., executive director of the Council of the Great...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Amidst a gloomy climate of failing schools and the stringent No Child Left Behind legislation, some communities have created a small revolution, achieving gains with children others had given up on—with implications for schools nationwide. In this penetrating documentary, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Hedrick Smith travels from inner city to rural town to observe how some districts and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Despite its horrific destruction, Hurricane Katrina gave New Orleans educators the opportunity to reinvent a school system that wasn't working. This program chronicles the first official year of public school in New Orleans after the storm and the transition to the widespread use of charter schools in the city. Focusing on predominantly African-American schools, the film examines the situation...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program with Bill Moyers compares the everyday experiences of two New York City middle school students and contrasts political rhetoric with the reality of American schooling. A profile of the two students and their different schools points out the inequalities of our current system and how disproportionate funding affects the quality of education. The program also features advocates for...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Contrary to popular belief, adequate preparation for college-level study is not an option for the majority of America's public-school students. This program exposes the educational "sorting machine," the factors that mold a child's academic future, through the case of a set of twins from Nevada: one, an academically oriented high achiever who is encouraged to take honors classes, and the other,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2004
View online at AVOD
Summary: This multi-segment program focuses on the world of education as it addresses aspects of how to conduct sociological research. After defining what exactly constitutes research, the video defines the concepts of reliability, validity, and representativeness through a study of social interaction in schools; sheds light on essential ideas in survey research via a study of educational inequalities;...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: To have a shot at college, students must first believe they can get into college. This program shows the positive things that can happen when the dream of a college education is nurtured in classrooms and communities where expectations previously had been low. By spotlighting innovative approaches for motivating and teaching children-from the Upward Bound initiative in Cleveland that can only...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2004
View online at AVOD
Summary: Use this ABC News program to explore links between a wide range of educational issues: school safety, overcrowding, privatization, and poor academic performance. The video takes viewers inside Chester High, a Pennsylvania school racked with security, staffing, and financial problems; in fact, Chester's difficulties are so great that the company hired to run the school has pulled out. With...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: James Comer, M.D., M.P.H., has spent decades promoting a focus on child development as a way of improving schools. In this interview, he and Hedrick Smith analyze the Comer Process, a school- and system-wide psychosocial intervention grounded in conflict mitigation, behavior modeling, power-sharing, and all-around involvement of teachers, parents, students, and other stakeholders. "Our program...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In this interview, Anthony Alvarado, the dynamic architect of controversial principal-centered educational reforms in New York City and San Diego schools, and Eric Smith, Ed.D., who has risen to national prominence as superintendent of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg and Anne Arundel County school districts, join Hedrick Smith to describe their methodologies and examine the results of their policies...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In 2003, the Wide Angle program Time for School profiled children in seven countries-Afghanistan, Benin, Brazil, India, Japan, Kenya, and Romania-as they started their first year of school, often in the face of great adversity. Three years later this Wide Angle episode returns to visit each child, updating the progress of their educational and personal development. The similarities and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006