Of Waitlists and Waiting for ‘Superman’

Commentary on the documentary Waiting for ‘Superman’ is not exactly in short supply. People love it, hate it, promote it, and dismiss it. But one thing is sure: You can’t beat the drama of a lottery wheel and rooms full of families desperately hoping their children might get lucky enough to attend a school that might change their life.

After seeing the movie, I couldn’t help but think about lotteries and waitlists that are less visible but just as prevalent, if not more so: the waiting lists of families who want to send their children to a high-quality early learning program – whether it is a childcare center, a pre-k or preschool program, full-day kindergarten or even a well-reputed elementary school that starts at age 3 or 4.

There is no registry of early-learning waitlists around the country – perhaps there should be – but a smattering of news reports paints the picture: In the Chicago Public Schools, more than 2,000 families are on waitlists for Preschool for All, the public pre-k program in Illinois. In DeKalb County, Georgia, more than 1,000 children are on waitlists to attend Georgia’s public pre-k program.  A charter school in New Orleans that offers pre-k receives 200 applications every year for 40 pre-k slots. Just look at poverty figures and Head Start enrollment numbers, and it is clear that Head Start – the federal pre-k program for children in families in poverty – is only serving about half of those who qualify.

One of the programs featured in the movie – the Harlem Children’s Zone – includes an emphasis on starting early and engaging families from the start. In fact, interviews with Geoffrey Canada, the founder of the HCZ, propel the film and help to make the movie’s very strong case for serious and sustained changes to the way we think about education in this country.

Other writers, such as Michael Levine of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center and Sarah Garland of The Hechinger Report, have also pointed out that the movie misses a chance to talk more sincerely about the importance of early education.

It is painful and distressing to lose out in lotteries and sit idly on wait lists while your children grow up in front of you.  No one wants to see more families to have to go through what is shown on screen in “Waiting for ‘Superman’. “ But it seems obvious that more parents should start to use the power of their stories – the long waitlists and often unfulfilled hopes to enroll their children in high-quality early learning programs —  to bolster the case for a more equitable education system.