FLASHPOINT ACADEMY FILM CREWS WERE LITERALLY EVERYWHERE THAT ANYTHING IMPORTANT WAS HAPPENING THROUGHOUT THE WEEK AT THE FILM FESTIVAL AND THE ONLY CREWS ALLOWED EXCLUSIVE FILM ACCESS TO THE MOST INFORMATIVE AND INFLUENTIAL QUESTION AND ANSWER SESSIONS WITH ALL THE GREAT AND TALENTED DIRECTORS IN TOWN TO TALK ABOUT THEIR LATEST FILMS.

THE BUSY WEEK WRAPPED UP WITH A PANEL OF EXPERTS HELD AT FLASHPOINT ACADEMY ENTITLED: “MAKING IT IN THE MIDWEST”. NEXT UP – FLASHPOINT TEAMS WILL BE HANDLING THE RED CARPET FOR THE CLOSING AND AWARD SESSIONS AND THE SCREENING OF “GOOD” DIRECTED BY VINCENTE AMORIM.

Q & A SESSIONS

MIKE LEIGH – HAPPY-GO-LUCKY

GAVIN O’CONNOR – PRIDE AND GLORY

DANNY BOYLE – SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE

CHARLIE KAUFMAN – SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK

DARREN ARONOFSKY – THE WRESTLER

NEW MAIN BROADCAST, FILM AND PERFORMANCE STAGE AT THE MERCHANDISE MART

DCP facilitates confidential match-making between those who have made proposals and DCP members (high-tech industry leaders in digital concepts) with whom the proponents wish to work.

Flashpoint Academy is developing a series of specific proposals and relationships thru DCP which will provide us and our students and faculty early and exclusive access to new digital technologies being developed in Japan years before these technologies are available to virtually anyone else in the United States.

This initiative is part of the City’s International Development programs and also a part of the Chicago Sister Cities International Program. Thanks to Tim Hill, Jr. from the Sister Cities program for helping to arrange this visit and relationship. We were ably assisted in our meetings by Dan Hodapp from our FP Admissions group who is a fluent speaker of Japanese.

Ken Nordine (born April 13, 1920) is an American voiceover and recording artist best known for his series of Word Jazz albums. His deep, resonant voice has also been featured in many commercial advertisements and movie trailers. One critic wrote that “you may not know Ken Nordine by name or face, but you’ll almost certainly recognize his voice.”

The son of an architect, Ken Nordine was born in Cherokee, Iowa. In Chicago he attended Lane Technical College Prep High School and the University of Chicago. He has three sons with his wife Beryl whom he married in 1945. He initially attracted attention when he recorded the aural vignettes on Word Jazz on Dot in 1957. Word Jazz, Son of Word Jazz (Dot, 1958) and his other albums in this vein feature Nordine’s narration over a cool jazz background. He began performing and recording such albums at the peak of the beat movement and was associated with the poetry-and-jazz movement. However, some of Nordine’s “writings are more akin to Franz Kafka or Edgar Allan Poe” than to the beats. Many of his word jazz tracks feature critiques of societal norms. Some are lightweight and humorous, while others reveal dark, paranoid undercurrents and bizarre, dream-like scenarios.

Nordine was Linda Blair’s vocal coach for her role in The Exorcist,and Word Jazz inspired Tom Waits’ spooky, spoken word-type pieces, such as “9th and Hennepin,” “Frank’s Wild Years” and “What’s He Building?”

On television, Nordine did a series of readings on a show titled Faces in the Window, and Fred Astaire danced to Nordine’s “My Baby” on a TV special. Nordine’s past radio series were Now Nordine and Word Jazz. He currently hosts a weekly radio program and maintains residences in Chicago, Illinois, and Spread Eagle, Wisconsin.

Ken Nordine completed a DVD entitled “The Eye is Never Filled” with a scheduled release date of 14 May 2007.

Details on the film (which has already been shown in a private presentation to Flashpoint students, staff and faculty) appear below or if you click here.

THE DOCUMENTARY

Regardless of nationality, as soon as a student completes the 8th grade, the clock starts ticking. From that very moment the child has approximately…Two Million Minutes until high school graduation…Two Million Minutes to build their intellectual foundation…Two Million Minutes to prepare for college and ultimately career…Two Million Minutes to go from a teenager to an adult?

How a student spends their Two Million Minutes – in class, at home studying, playing sports, working, sleeping, socializing or just goofing off — will effect their economic prospects for the rest of their lives.

How do most American high school students spend this time? What about students in the rest of the world? How do family, friends and society influence a student’s choices for time allocation? What implications do their choices have on their future and on a country’s economic future?

This film takes a deeper look at how the three superpowers of the 21st Century ?China, India and the United States ?are preparing their students for the future. As we follow two students – a boy and a girl – from each of these countries, we compose a global snapshot of education, from the viewpoint of kids preparing for their future.

Our goal is to tell the broader story of the universal importance of education today, and address what many are calling a crisis for U.S. schools regarding chronically low scores in math and science indicators.

In many ways the six kids simultaneously fit and break national stereotypes.

Take Rohit in Bangalore. He is under intense pressure from his folks to get into a top engineering university but blows off steam singing with his “boy band” and dreams of sending demos out to record companies. In Shanghai we meet math whiz Xiaoyuan, who, while awaiting word from Yale to see if she gained early acceptance, tries out as a violinist for the top music conservatory in Shanghai.

In Indianapolis we go to school with Neil. The senior class president and former star quarterback who gave up football to focus more on his studies. He has cruised through school, but now, with a full academic scholarship to Purdue University, wonders if he is up to the college challenge. The other students profiled in the documentary – Ruizhang, Brittany and Apoorva – face many of these universal adolescent pressures as well.

To put these narratives in context we have assembled an array of interviews with specialists like former U.S. Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich, Congressman Bart Gordon, chair of the House Committee on Science, Harvard economist Richard Freeman as well as top Indian CEOs, and leading scientists in America.

Statistics for American high school students give rise to concern for our student’s education in math and science. Less than 40 percent of U.S. students take a science course more rigorous than general biology, and a mere 18 percent take advanced classes in physics, chemistry or biology. Only 45 percent of U.S. students take math coursework beyond two years of algebra and one year of geometry. And 50 percent of all college freshmen require remedial coursework.

Meanwhile, both India and China have made dramatic leaps in educating their middle classes – each comparable in size to the entire U.S. population. Compared to the U.S., China now produces eight times more scientists and engineers, while India puts out up to three times as many as the U.S. Additionally, given the affordability of their wages, China and India are now preferred destinations for increasing numbers of multinational high-tech corporations.

Just as the Soviets’ launch of a tiny satellite ignited a space race and impelled America to improve its science education, many experts feel the United States has reached its next “Sputnik moment.” The goal of this film is to help answer the question: Are we doing enough with the time we have to ensure the best future for all?