I recently saw the movie The Blindside and thought it was great. Loved the story, the football (the coaches, more specifically), loved it. Today in my professor's end of semester lecture she used a report on the real story of The Blindside to teach the importance of being resilient and dreaming big. When I saw this again, I really stopped to think about what really happened. A wealthy family saw a poor kid in their private school who had no parents or home and showed him the most Christlike love possible. This kid had a GPA of 0.4 when he was enrolled into the private school and could not participate in sports of any kind, much less feel competent enough to be at such a school.
What is the lesson that is being shown us in this movie? When we look past Sandra Bullock's blonde hair and the cute kid who portrays SJ we can see a bold reality in America's school system. Despite what the message of the movie seems to be, wealthy people want nothing to do with poor kids being in their schools. Lets face it, the really rich will put their kids in a private school protected from the children of parents of lesser socioeconomic status. Those who can't afford that make sure to buy a house in an affluent neighborhood where property taxes are good enough to make a school up to their standards. Those who can't afford such real estate settle for whatever they get.
There are other students like Michael. Maybe not all of them without a change of clothes, maybe not all of them homeless, maybe not all of them lacking parents or guardians, but they're still in rough shape and they're still in equally deserving need of love and kindness. They have just as much right to the opportunities a good education provides.
A more cynical account (my first reaction to this realization, actually) would remark that maybe if we put more poor/disadvantaged kids in private schools they could actually receive help from others, but until they are seen they do not exist. There is no more Christlike example of love than that which the Tuohy family exemplified in their kind gesture. What this movie tells me, however, is that no one will help if those needing help are not forced into their environment. And even then those who help will likely be ostracized/criticized/judged by others, just as Leigh Ann was in her lunch group. That's the cynical account.
I have calmed down since then, though, and found the root of the problem, and it's not in where we live. The wealthy can live in gated communities and send their kids to private schools, that's fine. The middle class can move into whatever subdivision/community they care for, that's fine. We can't go around blaming each other for the inequality and injustice that exists in the world/nation/education system--nobody feels good when they're being blamed for something and they're most likely to refuse to cooperate. The answer lies in how this movie made us feel and how the Tuohy's feel. Because this feeling about helping others is what lies beneath education policies and the people behind them.
Now don't get me wrong, there's not a policy in the world that will do what the Tuohy's did for Michael Oher--under these circumstances only the most charitable acts of kindness and love can resolve their unfortunate situation. In Michael's case, as in many others, what is needed most is a loving parent who cares for the child and motivates the child to excel in school and in life. Where parents are present but this attitude isn't, students are just as likely to fall through the cracks.
As you have probably correctly thought to yourself, What can we do to change a parent's attitude? Well, I'm sure programs are out there, and some of them may even work, but on the whole they probably aren't that effective. While I don't think we can make everyone's situation better overnight through education funding reform I do think that there are measures that can be taken to give children a less damning sentence when they walk into their first grade classroom. Say what you will, but funding for schools based on local property taxes has brought about 'Savage Inequalities" that are the "Shame of the Nation" to use the words of Jonathan Kozol. Starting kids off in low-quality schools represents a bleak future, no different than their situation at home, that will follow them for their entire life.
So yes, I'm calling for equal funding for schools on a state level. I know that the recipie for capitalism calls for some to win, some to lose, but must some be born to sing the blues? Blaming the parents gives us a scapegoat, but while goats make us feel more self-assured about ourselves the children remain disadvantaged. And a goat does nothing for a disadvantaged child.
I mentioned earlier that the answer lies in the way people felt as they watched the film. What people felt as they saw the kindness of the Tuohy's change Michael's life is not conducive to the founding priniciples of this country despite our open practice of capitalism and less-open history of corruption.
Giving children an equal shot at education certainly qualifies as an effort to secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity. 'We the people'-although written by the educated elite of a young America-does not strictly refer to them only. It refers to all of us and each other's posterity. It is unconcerned with the education level, socioeconomic status and first language of the parent. It is the root of the American Dream as first defined by James Truslow Adams as one's ability to succeed in "attaining the fullest stature of which (he) is innately capable, and be recognized for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous cirumstances of birth or position." This is the culture of America, and it is the driving force behind the idea of providing free, appropriate public education to every child in the nation. And if the government is going to provide a service to its people, it should do so if not with the intent of providing an equally good service to each individual, at least an equally funded one.
So there's the real Blindside. I enjoyed the beginning of the movie when Sandra Bullock walks you through LT ending Joe Theismann's career. Sooner or later the huge disparity in education is going to sack us, but who knows whent that will be. Until then we can look past it blaming the parents, teachers and curriculum.
