Overview
The documentary Boys of Baraka, produced and directed by Heidi Ewing, and Rachel Grady is about 20 at risk boys from Baltimore, Maryland, who were selected to spend 2 years at a boarding school in Kenya, East Africa. The Baraka school is intended to change the attitude and behavior of their students, and give them specialized instruction to meet their educational needs. By removing them from their negative environment, it allowed them to focus on their education and themselves. The goals of the Baraka school are to get their students accepted into good high schools, and get a chance at better opportunities. 76 percent of black males from Baltimore do not graduate from high school, and 50 percent end up in jail. This statistic probably motivated many parents to agree to send their children to Kenya to avoid them becoming a statistic. The documentary follows four boys and their families in their transition from Baltimore to Kenya. …show more content…
The documentary highlighted the need for education that is individualized to meet the needs of the students. Two educational issues that concerned me in the documentary was the reading and math level of some of the students, and the Baraka school just focusing on the boys graduating from high school instead of college, or some type of post secondary education (Ewing & Grady, 2005).
Richard who is in the seventh grade is on a 2nd grade reading and math level. As a teacher, it is really hard to grasp how he made it to the seventh grade without receiving services to meet his needs. Richard who is very optimistic about being successful in school is so far behind that he would need more than just the Baraka school to get him the appropriate level. It made me think what in the world are the faculty members of his school doing that Richard did not receive the proper help he needed (Ewing & Grady,
The documentary Boys of Baraka, produced and directed by Heidi Ewing, and Rachel Grady is about 20 at risk boys from Baltimore, Maryland, who were selected to spend 2 years at a boarding school in Kenya, East Africa. The Baraka school is intended to change the attitude and behavior of their students, and give them specialized instruction to meet their educational needs. By removing them from their negative environment, it allowed them to focus on their education and themselves. The goals of the Baraka school are to get their students accepted into good high schools, and get a chance at better opportunities. 76 percent of black males from Baltimore do not graduate from high school, and 50 percent end up in jail. This statistic probably motivated many parents to agree to send their children to Kenya to avoid them becoming a statistic. The documentary follows four boys and their families in their transition from Baltimore to Kenya. …show more content…
The documentary highlighted the need for education that is individualized to meet the needs of the students. Two educational issues that concerned me in the documentary was the reading and math level of some of the students, and the Baraka school just focusing on the boys graduating from high school instead of college, or some type of post secondary education (Ewing & Grady, 2005).
Richard who is in the seventh grade is on a 2nd grade reading and math level. As a teacher, it is really hard to grasp how he made it to the seventh grade without receiving services to meet his needs. Richard who is very optimistic about being successful in school is so far behind that he would need more than just the Baraka school to get him the appropriate level. It made me think what in the world are the faculty members of his school doing that Richard did not receive the proper help he needed (Ewing & Grady,