SYNOPSICS
Fail State (2017) is a English movie. Alexander Shebanow has directed this movie. Gibson Frazier,David Halperin,Tom Harkin,Suzanne Mettler are the starring of this movie. It was released in 2017. Fail State (2017) is considered one of the best Documentary movie in India and around the world.
Executive produced by news legend Dan Rather, Fail State investigates the dark side of American higher education, chronicling decades of policy decisions in Washington DC that have given rise to a powerful and highly-predatory for-profit college industry. With echoes of the subprime mortgage crisis, the film lays bare how for-profit colleges exploited millions of low-income and minority students, leaving them with worthless degrees and drowning in student loan debt. Director Alexander Shebanow traces the rise, fall, and resurgence of the for-profit college industry, uncovering their Wall Street backing and incestuous relationship with the regulators and lawmakers charged with overseeing them.
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Fail State (2017) Reviews
An important call to action
I remember when I was a kid in the 90's, watching daytime TV during the summer and noticing that every commercial seemed to be for ITT Tech. Even as a kid, I thought it seemed super scammy to target so heavily people at home watching daytime TV. Beyond that, though, this was a subject I didn't know a lot about, and the documentary does an excellent job in making it easy to follow the process that led to the rise of for-profit colleges and exactly why that they do is so predatory. There were several "wow" moments where you just rock back, amazed at how boldly these companies rip off people who are already at a disadvantage and how hardly anyone, especially among elected lawmakers (on both side of the aisle) who receive gigantic campaign contributions from these companies, seems willing to stop them. It isn't all hopeless, though. The documentary also highlights how good community colleges are in actually doing the things for-profits claim to do, and opened my eyes to how much supporting them is one of the most effective, helpful things we can do to support higher education in this county. This is a really great, insightful documentary that exposes truths about a terrible industry. I highly recommend it and am grateful to the filmmakers for doing this work and the people featured in the documentary for sharing their knowledge and experiences.
A wasted opportunity ruined by partisanship
Its the usual narrative, a fixation on the private sector schools fleecing people with fraudulent credentials, which is a real problem, but fails to get down to the more fundamental problem which is far less convenient to the political agenda of the documentary makers, that this problem extends to all schools. In the push to universalize higher education the assumption was made that you could make successful people through access to university, failing to realize that many of the people who went to university in the past would have been successful regardless, they were a different breed. And so with the dumbing down of higher education you have the manufacturing of credentials and departments like with "gender studies" It wouldn't matter if these degrees didn't come with debt, they were worthless to begin with. Add the debt issue and you have created a self perpetuating machine of credential-ism through debt. And not only that, you have created a system of manufacturing activists. This extended high school system created a self reinforcing filter for compliance, as the most compliant students would jump through all the hoops to succeed in the system, and having succeeded in the system, they would perpetuate this system of obedience to authority. This system creates a perverse trust in academia when the microcosm of society they run themselves is the most dysfunctional around. Administrators and professors gorge themselves on the future generations debt. No one ever asked if this level of education was truly necessary, possible or even sustainable. The fertility rate of "educated" women kind of says it all, either this is dysgenics in action, or its evolution as the obedience are weeded out, so it maybe self correcting in the end, but the collateral damage to civilization is too great to let it play out that way. The solution is harsh but it is the only way to finally solve the problem, student debt should not be guaranteed, and loans should end, only then will colleges charge customers only what they can actually afford. The documentary makers so fond of their mad Maxine Waters clips would rather push to fuel the self destructive system by providing ever wider access, and even more unlimited funds. This documentary dishonestly conflates the post war boom which was only possible through the destruction of all our competitors by war combined with the residual christian work ethic and family values we still had at the time with simple access to higher education. It turns a multi factorial issue into a simplistic uni-factorial problem where education becomes the magic bean solution, and that misguided notion is exactly what has created this monstrous machine of student debt and credentialism. Go look up the "women's studies" departments salaries and department cost at your local college, and try to justify it, you can't, they only exist to manufacture their own justification for existing, and the financial damage is almost minimal compared to what that ripple of indoctrination does when it interacts with the rest of society, usually manifesting in just alternate forms of extortionate parasitism. Spending its time blaming republicans, the documentary completely misses the point that the entire higher educational system is archaic. Most professors reciting the same lectures like automatons, they don't ask if a single exceptional professor in some video format would do better, for instance on YouTube where many examples already exist. This documentary is in service of a system which is highly inefficient and doesn't scale, asking all the wrong questions. The most basic one being that if students are this easily fooled into false programs, why would you imagine they were fit for a conventional degree program. These are people who would have been better suited to practical job training/vocational programs, which were pushed by the wayside by democrats who pushed the unrealistic dream that "everyone could be an astronaut". The scam goes much further than this documentary will acknowledge, because it implicates those they are ideologically in league with, and opens them to dealing with unquestioned presuppositions they would rather continue go unquestioned.
Long overdue feature length expose into the systemic corruption of the US higher education system
Our education system has been continually betraying taxpayers and students by taking away their protections and protecting the industry predators. This film does an excellent job at recounting the history of how the greed of private interests worked to undermine the once noble pursuit of going to college. Watch this film, share this film. It is imperative that we not only find relief for the generation of students affected by this fraudulent debt, but also put an end to the debt incurred by future students. Our grandparents did not have student debt, so why are we ok with 44 million students and taxpayers now living under 1.5 trillion of it? This money is not going into the betterment of the system- it is going to the fat cats on wall street and corrupt loan companies. So why defend it? We need to understand the causes that led to this and realize that we can undo the damage if we act now. Many top economists agree that cancelling all student debt in the country would be vastly more beneficial to the economy than allowing it to continue to persist and burden those living with it. Search online for "The Macroeconomic effects of student debt cancellation" by the levy institute to learn more. We can fix this- but first we have to understand how it was made and how it should not even exist in the first place. It was a result of the government and accreditors failing to protect students because they were themselves making money off of the corruption.
Evil Backstory of Student Loans
Education is a must in today's world unfortunately some organizations treat you like garbage and getting paid at the same time. This documentary brings you to the dark world of student loans showcasing the people who prey on the weak and the poor.
Conspiracy nonsense or harsh reality?
Seeing some of the things suggested in this video, it's pretty clear that it's all conspiracy nonsense- any level headed person is going to know damn well that some of the things suggested in this movie are just nonsense- a school trying to charge $90,000 for a gaming program that uses youtube videos? An IT program that teaches computer 101 courses and helps you put together a resume that makes you look like a network guru? And this has been going on for HOW long- DECADES? Nonsense, who would ever think these school could possibly get away with this kind of scam for so long, right under everyone's noses, while the federal government continued to provide students with financial aid to attend, and even with all of the countless complaints? It's just ridiculous to even suggest, and too hard a pill to swallow! On the other hand, i went to one of these schools- i don't bother to bring it up with friends, i've just gotten used to the idea that all of the above is the overall mindset of most people. The suggestion that these so called schools are actually doing this to people while to federal gov't supplies tens of billions in loans while profiting at least as much- it's ludicrous, impossible to convince anyone who isn't willing to spend some time looking at the facts and digging. Well this movie puts all of the facts right there on the table- no more digging, cross referencing and searching-it's all here- you still need to fact check- never depend on anything you see in movies- but it matches my experience, and some of the data i wasn't familiar with before looks to be right on. Thanks for finally making a video that documents these atrocities, making it easier for people who just don't have time to do their own homework to put everything together. These people are screwing everyone, and have been getting away with it for decades, right under everyone's noses, while the endless complaints just continue to be ignored, especially by the VA and the DOE. There are two facebook support groups, one for Art Institute, one for ITT tech- if you've had this problem with any for profit school, you should join both, since the information found in either will be relevant.