American Teacher to be screened Oct. 12

Skidmore will host a screening of American Teacher, a documentary film narrated by Matt Damon, at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 12, in the Payne Room of the Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery.

Admission is free and open to the public. The presentation is co-sponsored by the Teachers Salary Project. The College's Education Studies Department is hosting the on-campus screening.

American Teacher chronicles the stories of four teachers - Erik Benner, Jonathan Dearman, Jamie Fidler, and Rhena Jasey - who live and work in disparate urban and rural areas of the country. By following these teachers as they reach different milestones in their careers, the film tells the deeper story of the teaching profession in America today. The film shows the experience of these four young teachers as they recognize the importance of what they do, and how much they love what they do, but ask: can I afford to continue to teach?

The feature-length documentary was produced and directed by Academy Award?winning filmmaker Vanessa Roth; produced by N nive Calegari, co-founder of the literacy non-profit 826 National, and best-selling author Dave Eggers; and narrated by Academy Award-winner Matt Damon. Based on the New York Times best-selling book, Teachers Have It Easy: The Big Sacrifices and Small Salaries of America's Teachers (The New Press: 2005), American Teacher is supported by the Teachers Salary Project, a nonprofit organization offering an interactive online resource and a national outreach campaign to change how teachers are valued in our society.