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English 111-OW

16 April 2017

Waiting for Superman

Public schools are an all too common hot topic in today’s society. Unfortunately, public schools

in the United States are rife with problems, particularly in regards to their inability to provide American

children with an education that allows them to be competitive with children in other nations,

particularly in Europe. In Waiting for Superman, director Davis Guggenheim uses logos, pathos, and

ethos to effectively convince the viewer of the failing public school system and how it will affect future

generations if it is not fixed quickly.

Waiting for Superman introduces the viewer to five very different public school students and

their families as they try to get into private programs in hopes of receiving a better education. These five

families come from all different walks of life from a boy raised by his grandmother, to a single mother

who is struggling to keep her child out of public schools all together. The documentary also sheds light

on shocking data comparing a public education to a private one. Although the director is rarely seen, his

purpose and persuasive message is felt by anyone who views the movie.

Guggenheim uses logos throughout his documentary; there are concrete statistics on every

topic of the public school system ranging from where schools are located, data about teachers, and how

social status structure affects education. He uses interviews from educators, chancellors, and other

authoritative figures that play large roles in the public education system. He also shows footage of

presidential candidates as they promise a change if they are elected president, he then shows statistics

on what actually happened when the candidate was elected. These interviews provide inside

information as to the running of public schools using both deductive, and inductive reasoning through
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charts, and other visuals. The use of logos has a major impact on the way the viewer thinks of the school

system, the data shown in this documentary is not just something that can be thrown together in a few

weeks or months. The viewer can easily see that Guggenheim had done extensive research for

numerous years on this topic, and the viewer is therefore more likely to believe his side of the

argument.

Pathos was a game changer in this documentary, Guggenheim uses the stories of five children,

and he gives a bird’s eye view into the struggles each family faces while in the public school system.

Throughout the film the viewer follows the families as they fight to get their children into public charter

schools in hopes of receiving a better education. The viewer rejoices as a couple of the children are

accepted, but sympathize with the other three who were not fortunate enough to be accepted. The

director uses the music choices to tug on the heartstrings of the viewer as the tone becomes somber as

the families learn their child has not been accepted. Interviews are conducted with both the children

and their guardians. A very memorable moment shows one of the young girls staring out of her window

at her school across the street on the morning of her graduation ceremony to the next grade. It shows

her mother crying because she was unable to pay some of the young child’s tuition at the school and the

principal would not let the girl participate in her graduation ceremony with her classmates. This scene

plays on pathos because all the viewer would want to do is help this single mother and her child for this

young girl could participate in her graduation. Guggenheim uses scenes like this effectively to persuade

the viewer that public education has become so bad in places that parents will literally give their last

dollar to a private institution in order for their child to have a better chance at education and a brighter

future than what they had.

Ethos did not play as big a role as other elements in Waiting for Superman. At the beginning of

the film, Guggenheim shows footage of his previous documentary of the teachers in the public school

system. He explains that the purpose of that documentary was to give him an inside look at teachers in
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public school for when it was time for his children to go to school he would be able to effectively choose

the best public school he can in the area. This information helped establish him as an established

documentarian, it showed he had experience in this field which made him more trustworthy.

Guggenheim also uses ethos to establish himself as a concerned parent he tells his audience that his

documentaries were meant to persuade people that the public school system was getting better and for

people to not give up hope, but Guggenheim is honest with his audience and one quote stands out: “…

So every morning, betraying the ideas I thought I lived by, I drive past three public schools as I take my

kids to a private school. But I am lucky, I have a choice, other families pin their hopes to a bouncing ball,

a hand pulling a card from a box, or a computer that generates numbers in random sequence. Because

when there is a great public school, there aren’t enough spaces and so we do what’s fair, we place our

children and their future in the hands of luck.” The use of this quote reveals to the viewer that

Guggenheim is a very concerned parent and questions his own research when it came to his children’s

future. He went against his first thoughts of the public school system and decided to enroll his own

children into private school. By including this information, the viewer is exposed to the dire condition of

the public school system and how, if something is not done soon, it will inevitably fail.

In the Documentary Waiting for Superman, Davis Guggenheim effectively uses logos, pathos,

and ethos to effectively persuade the viewer of his point of view about the public school system. When

the evidence revealed in logos is combined with the emotional ties of pathos and ethos, the fact that the

public school system is suffering becomes crystal clear. The viewer is compelled to believe that all public

school students are waiting for a “Superman” to rescue them and help them receive a proper education,

but it is becoming clearer that the hero everyone is looking for does not exist. Guggenheim effectively

shows the viewer it is up to them as to what happens to the future generations will they fall through the

cracks, or will adults finally become the Superman the young people need?
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Works Cited

Guggenheim, Davis, dir. Waiting for “Superman”. Narrator, Davis Guggenheim. Performers Bill

Strickland, Geoffrey Canada, Michelle Rhee, and Randi Weingarten. 2011. Paramount Home

Entertainment. DVD-ROM