Movie Response - Prompt 1

When I first looked at the outcomes of each of the students I was a little surprised to see what happened to Luisa and Travis. I had expected the film to prove how technology led to success in every one of their lives. But after seeing each outcome and thinking about the different factors, each result seemed fitting to the circumstances and living situations of each student. Their family and financial situations proved to be the issues affecting the students the most. It wasn’t a surprise that Cedra was able to attend college after high school. Financially her family was well off and had four computers in her own household. Her family had no difficulty affording for her to go to college. Luisa on the other hand, is not part of a family that is as financially sound and must work at a local fast food restaurant for a source of income. Her necessity to work prohibits her from graduating high school on time and consumes valued time needed for preparing herself for the Photoshop exam. Similar to Luisa, Travis’ family issues hindered his success in high school and prevented him from entering into college after high school. With no father, at age 18 he is already the man of the household and must take care of his family. Due to this, he is financially unable to afford college. Additionally, Kep due to his achievement of valedictorian receives a great deal of financial aid, allowing him to attend college. Without this scholarship, Kep might not have been able to attend college, especially one as esteemed as Cal Tech.
These results show that technology, although it arguably helped each student’s life, did not provide a solution to family and financial issues. The only one that seemed to benefit greatly from technology was Kep. Receiving valedictorian at Tech High School allowed him to attend a good college that would provide a sound future. Cedra was also able to attend college, but was most attributed to her family’s financial situation. Although she benefited from being raised around technology as her dad’s career involves working with computers, she still wouldn’t have been able to attend college if her family’s economic status was similar to that of Travis or Luisa. Technology was unable to produce an escape from the family and financial issues of the two. Although their new knowledge of technology could prove to be an asset to obtaining a good occupation, a college degree for each of them would have proved to be more beneficial.