I'm a High School World Language teacher in Connecticut, and I have done this job for 35 years. The conditions shown on this film, the teacher attitudes of blaming the student's socio-economic background for their failures, the funding going to well to do schools while denying aid to needy communities, the touchy-feelie self-esteeem fiends, those who maintain that minority kids can not learn, the blaming of the parents, etc., all these situations still exist not only in California where the film took place but right here in my town in Connecticut and in many places around the country. Now you have to add NCLB, administrators teching techers how to teach, the warm embrace of educationalese theories by the state educational agencies, bandwaggonism of tired ideas of teaching and learning and the bad ecomomy, to exacerbate these conditions. The school authorities who must have watched this film, learned absolutely nothing from it. Some things never change. Escalante had to leave due to many reasons, specially pressure by school administrators just like in my school system where Teachers of the Year, costumarily leave after just one year of being chosen T.O.T.Y.
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