Check out The Teacher Salary Project!
Emily
website to learn more at http://theteachersalaryproject.org OR read
about us below! If you want to get involved or have any questions
please feel free to email me at em...@theteachersalaryproject.org!
_______________________________________________________________________________________
THE TEACHER SALARY PROJECT is a feature-length documentary film,
interactive online resource, and national outreach campaign that
delves into the core of our educational crisis from the eyes and
experiences of our nation's teachers. Based on the New York Times
bestselling book, Teachers Have It Easy, by journalist and teacher
Daniel Moulthrop, co-founder of the 826 National writing programs
Nínive Calegari, and writer Dave Eggers. THE TEACHER SALARY PROJECT is
produced by Eggers and Calegari, and directed by Academy Award–winning
filmmaker Vanessa Roth.
Our educational system must change. Currently, 30 percent of American
students drop out of school by age 18. Fewer than 30 percent of all
eighth-grade students are proficient in grade-level reading and math.
Most significantly, students from urban, financially disadvantaged
backgrounds are at a greater risk for decreased cognitive development
and ability, lower school attendance, and higher rates of grade
failure and early drop-out. And though it is well documented that the
most important factor in students' school achievement and future
success is the quality of their teachers, 46 percent of public school
teachers leave the profession within the first five years of being in
the classroom.
A good teacher has the power to change the course of a life. A teacher
can move a child from poverty to promise by providing him or her with
the skills and confidence necessary to be carried into adulthood—yet
because teachers in the United States have historically had an average
annual salary lower than their peers with similar educational
backgrounds, 50 percent of our nation's best teachers must have second
jobs outside of the classroom—like tutoring, mowing lawns, selling
stereos, bartending—to be able to afford to teach.
Our educators are responsible for imparting knowledge, mentoring,
guiding, and fostering our nation's future, yet as a culture we
discredit the profession. It is through this historical, societal, and
systematic devaluing of our nation’s most important profession that
our children are faced with broken schools and low prospects. It is
time that we address this educational crisis and make teaching the
prestigious, competitive, and sustainable profession it deserves to
be. Only then can we improve the success rates of our country’s
children and keep our democracy thriving.
In this spirit, THE TEACHER SALARY PROJECT will become the story by
and about those closest to the issues in our educational system—the
3.2 million teachers who spend every day in the classroom in every
corner of the country. Through an interactive and evolving website
informed by personal testimonies by and about America’s best teachers—
which will become the only digital archive of teachers’ stories about
teaching—and a feature-length documentary that brings together the
richest of those online submissions, archival material, educational
experts, student interviews, and a year of documenting the day-to-day
lives and sacrifices of public school teachers, THE TEACHER SALARY
PROJECT will bring an awareness to the real and imminent crisis in our
educational system—how little we value our strongest, most committed,
and effective teachers, and the ripple effect this has on how our
children learn and their future success.
In keeping with the storytelling styles of both Dave Eggers (writer)
and Vanessa Roth (director), THE TEACHER SALARY PROJECT will be a
character-driven film, which tells moving and compelling stories that
explore this urgent issue through humor, irony, and the energy of the
teachers who fill the screen. The important facts and statistics that
will give historical and social context will be interspersed with
illustrations and animation by well-known artists and will incorporate
quirky, campy—and outdated—educational filmstrips of teachers in
America. Additionally, music icons who are passionate about public
education reform will record an original soundtrack for the film.
Beginning in the summer of 2008, we will gather and share continually
updated resources, facts, and information by and for teachers across
the country; assemble a national network of community outreach
partners committed to the project’s goals; and invite teachers to
submit videos of themselves teaching, talking about teaching, and
providing first-hand accounts of their struggles, frustrations,
sacrifices, and successes as educators—in their own words and with
their own cameras. As these stories build upon each other and we begin
to accept submissions from the community at large about the impact of
teachers in their lives, THE TEACHER SALARY PROJECT will become the
only digital archive of teaching in America. Selected submissions will
become a vital part of our film, giving it a “cast of thousands.”
Additionally, in the fall of 2008 and continuing through the 2008–2009
school year, we will film the lives of three dynamic teachers from
across the country who represent the challenges and sacrifices our
best teachers must make to continue to remain in the classroom. These
individuals, through their everyday experiences as educators and their
choices over the course of the school year—to either stay in or leave
their teaching positions—will show us how important it is that we as a
society change the position that teachers hold. The diverse
testimonials and experiences contributed via the website/online
channel will be woven together with historic, archival material,
facts, educational experts, and the in-depth and moving stories of
professionally filmed educators. THE TEACHER SALARY PROJECT will
engage, challenge, and inspire audiences to be part of an urgently
needed progressive social change, resulting in a real and lasting
impact on the lives of our nation's children.
Taking advantage of this historic time in national politics and on the
eve of electing a new President, we are committed to playing a vital
role in this urgent issue. Please join us in this exciting and
important endeavor.