Superman's effect

Superman's effect
A new paper from the American Enterprise Institute re-examines the film Waiting for Superman, finding it to have been neither overwhelming success nor abject failure, but a new kind of advocacy that solicited public sympathy and support through popular media. The report credits the film with real-world effects: creation of The Huffington Post education page; $2 million in classroom donations from ticket sales and DonorsChoose; and increased interest and funding for participating nonprofits and schools. Participant -- Superman's production company -- in its promotional materials credits the film with creation of StudentsFirst, use of the parent trigger, and a February 2011 speech from the AFT around revamping teacher evaluation and tenure, among other things. A 2011 study by the Ford Foundation found film viewers remembered key facts afterward and expressed interest in learning more, but the movie was "unable to foster a national conversation among those not previously invested in the education-reform debate." A 2013 study from USC found viewers learned key concepts and were more likely to seek information about public education, encourage friends to demand better schools, donate books or materials, and volunteer. Still, the movie only weakly motivated viewers to take larger organizational action. The paper draws several lessons for this newer advocacy: a campaign's main characters must be diverse enough to engage a broad audience, and address fundamental issues over narrow ones; it must resist the urge to be comprehensive, and can be controversial only to a point; and producers should anticipate being misunderstood and prepare counter-arguments, as well as devise concrete actions for viewers and policymakers to take. More

Source:  Public Education News Blast

Published by LEAP

Los Angeles Education Partnership (LAEP) is an education support organization that works as a collaborative partner in high-poverty communities.

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