Documentary Reflection Paper #4

Education is something I am extremely passionate about and interested in, so for module

four, I decided to watch Frontline: A Subprime Education. The documentary focuses on the for-

profit college industry and the problems that come with it. I learned a lot while watching this

documentary, with the most shocking thing being that there are a lot of scams in the for-profit

college industry. (Gaviria, 2016) The documentary focuses on one specific company in the for-

profit college industry, which is Corinthian College, Inc. (Gaviria, 2016) This company was

scamming people out of their money, jobs, as well as an education. (Gaviria, 2016) For example,

three women who attended Everest College, a college supported by Corinthian College, Inc.,

were all promised help with getting jobs after graduation. (Gaviria, 2016) Months later, after

several interviews, none of them had jobs. (Gaviria, 2016) Later in the documentary, it is

revealed by one of these women that her degree was useless, and it was as if she didn’t even have

a degree because no one would hire her. (Gaviria, 2016) Not only that, she had to pay every

penny back and start all over again. (Gaviria, 2016) Another example of how people were being

scammed was a couple who attended Heald College, also supported by Corinthian College, Inc.,

dropped out in their third semester but were still being billed. (Gaviria, 2016)

While watching the documentary, I noticed quite a few ways numbers, symbols, causes,

and incentives were used to tell a story about education policy, and I wanted to point a few out.

Symbols are what stood out clearly to me. Symbols, as stated by Stone, are “anything that stands

for something else” (Stone, p. 157, 2012) and “also tell stories”. (Stone, p. 158, 2012) One type

of story is of power. (Stone, p. 165, 2012) “It links helplessness and control as the two sides of

power relationships”, says Stone. (Stone, p. 165, 2012) A story of power and helplessness is used

in the documentary to tell a story about education policy is when they talk about how these for-
profit colleges are taking advantage of vulnerable people and how they are using their power to

make a profit off of them. (Gaviria, 2016) The other thing that really stood out to me while

watching the documentary was causes. According to Stone, there are four types of causes and

they are mechanical, accidental, intentional, and inadvertent. (Stone, p. 208, 2012) The type of

cause I found to be presented in the documentary was intentional. Intentional causes include

oppression, conspiracies, and harmful side effects that are known but ignored. (Stone, p. 208,

2012) Intentional causes are used as more of a way to discuss the documentary overall. As I

stated earlier, this documentary focuses a lot on Corinthian College, Inc. and how it was

scamming people out of jobs, money, and an education. This company was aware of the things

they were doing and continued to do it to make a profit. That is until the public started catching

on which eventually led to Corinthian College, Inc. to file for bankruptcy. (Gaviria, 2012)

Symbols, I think, are a great way to define a problem because they are able to tell stories

(Stone, p. 158, 2012) as well as make them personal, and if enough people tell them and hear

them, the problem can be addressed. I think that causes are another good way to define a

problem. I think they are a good way to define a problem because causes put the responsibility

on something or someone and addresses why these things happen. (Stone, p. 206-207, 2012)

When it comes to convincing policy makers to make a policy change, I think using symbols is

the way to go. Like I said before, they can tell stories (Stone, p. 158, 2012) and make things

personal. Making things personal can get people to sympathize and want to address the situation

and make a change.

I never thought there would be so many problems with the for-problem college industry,

so it was interesting to learn about them and some of the things that have gone on in it. It was

especially surprising to find out about the scams that have gone on in it though! I also found it
interesting to learn about the different types of problem definition strategies and use them to

define the problems in the for-profit college industry. The problem defining strategies that we

learned about in module four are going to be helpful in the future when defining problems in all

different areas!

References:

Gaviria, M. (Writer). (2016, September 13). Frontline: A Subprime Education [Video file].

Retrieved June 04, 2020, from https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/a-subprime-

education/.

Stone, D. (2012). Policy Paradox: The Art of Political Decision Making (3rd ed.). New York,

NY: W.W. Norton & Company.