EDUCATION
More Powerful Than Celebrity George Clooney and LA School Superintendent Austin Beutner are creating a powerful new model for education—and they’re using the film industry to do it By Ca ro l Bada r acco Padge t t
E ighty percent of the students we serve live in poverty,” Austin Beutner states. He recently stepped down after a three-year term as super- intendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) in Los Angeles, California. It’s an immense district that serves 26 cities with about 650,000 students across the LA area. “Imagine if all the school districts in Atlanta were one,” Beutner says, “and you’d becloser to what LAUSD is—the second largest in the nation by student and the largest by area.” To serve these students could easily feel like an insurmountable feat. But to George Clooney, who ap- proached Beutner with a new magnet school concept in spring 2021, it looked like a mountain of opportunity. So together, they’re crafting a vision for a new school to be launched fall 2022 in LA: the Roybal School of Film and Television Production for grades 9-12. “Most students in our schools don’t live next door to a cinematographer, songwriter, or makeup artist,” Beutner says. So while they live in the center of the film industry, they do not see themselves as belonging there or having access to the countless jobs that support the industry. “Consider cinematography. Look through a lens and understand what the light is doing,” Beutner says. “It’s physics. It’s science. But physics and science by themselves can be hard to approach.” He continues, “Makeup artistry is chemistry. And there’s a great deal of math in music. Screenwriting and literacy, they go hand in hand.” Of the school that he, Clooney, and their partners are building, Beutner finds, “It’s a different approach in the classroom, and the school will provide internships to every single student.” Beutner acknowledges that the objectives for the Roybal school can easily be overshadowed by the celebrity of its backers. Alongside Clooney are Kerry Washington, Don Cheadle, Eva Longoria, Bryan Lourd, Mindy Ka- ling, and others, and it’s these names that have headlined much of the press on the project. Yet, it’s the opportunity for students in underserved communities in LA—and in Atlanta and across the country, if Clooney and Beutner have their way—that’s the real breaking news. Beutner knows firsthand the impact that a different approach can bring to kids at schools. Five years ago with the help of the Atlanta Hawks and other partners, he brought an initiative to public school students called Vision To Learn.
“
Director Austin Beutner working with children in Los Angeles. Plans to bring this program to Georgia are underway.
“One in four kids needs glasses, but most children in low-income communities don’t have them,” Beutner notes. “It’s an issue of access. Before Vision To Learn, maybe a vision screening was done at school and a note went home with the child saying they needed to see an eye doctor. And nothing happened.” With Vision To Learn, local eye care professionals go into schools and conduct eye screenings. If a child doesn’t pass, they’re provided with an eye exam. Then if they need glasses, they get to pick out a pair on the spot. All free of charge to the child and their family. “They’re doing it as a group, so the cool kids are those getting their glasses with the Hawks,” Beutner says. And perhaps even more important: “The kid who gets glasses immediately does better in school. Their self-esteem is better. The child who lacks the glasses they need is misdiagnosed as a behavior problem, mislabeled as a poor learner, and eventually drops out. This simple intervention can have profound consequences.” Beutner brings this thinking full circle, back to the Roybal school’s new model for teaching high school students math, chemistry, physics, and geometry through real-world application and internships centered around the film and television industry. “It’san interesting parallel that seeing a problem clearly is the first step to solving the problem,” he muses. Clooney’s thinking on the matter: “Our aim is to better reflect the diversity of our country. That means starting early. It means creating high school programs
that teach young people about cameras and editing and visual effects and sound, and all the career opportunities that this industry has to offer. It means internships that lead to well-paying careers. It means understanding that we’re all in this together.” career opportunities that this industry has to offer. Our aim is to better ref lect the diversity of our country. [...] It means creating high school programs that teach young people about cameras and editing and visual effects and sound, and all the
@austinlaschools
10 | T H E G E O R G I A H O L L Y WO O D R E V I E W | F A L L 2 0 21
Made with FlippingBook - Online catalogs