Race to Nowhere--education documentary

Race to Nowhere (www.racetonowhere.com) is a new educational documentary by parent Vicki Abeles focusing on the overly competitive educational system which has been created for high schoolers in the US. Many of today's students who are overworked by homework, extracurricular activities, rehearsals, varsity sports and more are suffering from depression, headaches, stomach aches, anorexia and anxiety. As the creator and director of the film states, "We want the best for our kids"--watching kids today and the stress they are under led this parent to document and then challenge current paradigms for education.

There were many distinguished educators and psychologists in the film emphasizing the point that in today's society we are asking students to perform at a much higher level than in the past. Sarah Bennett, author of Stop Homework noted that in her research--homework does not make kids smarter. Apparently, there is no correlation between academic achievement and homework. Dr. Deborah Stipek from the SOE at Stanford University noted that there is no equity in schools and kids in low-income schools do not get the resources that other kids in high-income schools get such as tutoring for ACT/SAT, computers, summer opportunities, etc. Dr Denise Pope, another Stanford education professor and author (Doing School: How We Are Creating a Generation of Stressed-Out, Materialistic, and Miseducated Students) noted that the implication of tutoring says to the student--you can't do it alone, we need to help you. This lends itself to the culture of "perform and then produce" and leaves out the all-important step of processing. Many of the educators noted that "smart" has many different meanings.

Due to the 2002 No Child Left Behind laws, we now have students drowning in content and tests. Unfortunately in the US, success is measured by how much money you make v how happy you are. What does it mean to be successful for kids?

How do we get kids to love learning? Learning is power. We need to raise critical thinkers and problem solvers. The point of education is to learn, not to memorize facts. The documentary asks: What type of individuals are we trying to create for our society? What does it take to produce a happy, motivated and creative human being?