Obvious influences include this cartoon or its quote's originator, Diane Ravitch, and superhero tropes. What's not to love? Well, if you're an ed reformer, it's that he's speaking the TRUTH. He knows his education history too, and especially the the rhetoric of "crisis" and "failure." I can't recommend viewing this video enough.
Some salient quotes:
"The only way to feed a business model in this toxic culture of education is to perpetuate a picture of failure."
"There is no money in long-term student success."
"Rigor has replaced the word relevant."
"Follow the money."
"The reality is that most teachers are accomplishing amazing feats of human achievement and motivation with their students everyday, and what they are able to accomplish is being done despite a professional environment of questioning, belittling, and self-doubt due to accountability measures and evaluation systems we [probably meaning teachers, teacher educators, and the general public, most likely] had no stake in even creating."
While you're in the movie mood, watch the below documentary, which influences EduStank's thoughts on public school reform and offers more actual, good solutions to real problems in the system which need addressing.
The film is entitled The Inconvenient Truth About Waiting For Superman, and if the YouTube link doesn't work, try the vimeo link. It reads best when viewed after seeing the very pro ed reform Waiting for Superman.
Taken together, they offer great content in an accessible medium and with frankness most anyone can understand.
Special thanks to University of South Florida professor Joan Kaywell for bringing the TED talk to my attention.
UPDATE:
In the spirit of selling this post as a one-stop resource for great filmic representations of the arguments against ed reform, I present to you a link to the documentary Building the Machine: The Common Core Documentary:
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