C'mon Superman, let's make a plan!

I have always wondered why Europeans think American education is crappy. Sure, every European I know speaks at least two languages fluently. Sure, my Spanish is mediocre, at best, despite four years of torturous lessons. But that cannot have anything to do with American education, could it? Nah.
 
My mother came here around age seventeen. She hadn’t finished high school in Denmark. She walked right into a test, and received her G.E.D. She even did well enough to walk with a local high school. Now, I would like to think that this happened because my mom is a genius, but there is definitely more going on.
 
This is how Waiting for Superman comes into play. Director Davis Guggenheim questions the validity and quality of education in American public schools today. Due to circumstance and socioeconomic status, we are led to question, if in fact, we are all equally eligible to go to college.
 
We learn that children that grow up to attend college are eight times less likely to go to prison. We see how charter schools and specialized education is often doled out through lottery and luck. I know personally someone I dated only went to a charter school in his district because his sister had attended. He received preference because his sister got in. How did she get in? Lottery. And these are not inner-city kids in an overpopulated area. These are Massachusetts residents from a sleepy town near New Hampshire. If children in Massachusetts, a state renowned for its education at all levels, are only granted “specialized” education on a lottery basis, then what is the hope for other parts of the United States?
 
I cannot begin to get into the details of this film, simply because I am too uninformed to pretend I know what I am talking about. I can only discuss what I have seen. I have seen Europeans attending school with a higher level of academia upon graduation. I have seen upper middle class white kids struggle to go to a school that focuses on individual education and personal growth. And let’s face it, if rich white kids in Massachusetts are struggling for a better education, you know the government is paying even less attention to everyone else. Unfortunate, but true.
 
I worry about our education system, I really do. The “American Dream” still exists, but it is becoming harder and harder to attain. This is an instance where the idea of state government vs. national government works against us. How can the states individually work on their level of education and resources when the federal government dictates regulations to place everyone at the “same level”? And, it is easy to see why these nationwide mandates are necessary because then some states would certainly leave others in the dust. How can we approach a situation that is so personal to each community on a nationwide level?