Documentary Reflection: Meditating on Medicaid

Here it is! An honest reflection of the documentary process.  It had its ups and downs, but in the end, I learned a lot about Medicaid and disability care in the U.S.  Making this documentary motivates me to make change!

My group’s documentary topic was a criticism of the present-day attendant care benefits for disabled persons.  It dissected policy that was ineffective for disability rights flexibility and drew upon the personal experiences of two disabled healthcare recipients.  Now that my group is close to finishing this project, I am excited to see the end product and create an advocating message.  Having covered disability studies in my last year’s Inspirations play for drama class, the topic of disabled rights is of huge importance to me.  I will even further explore this through an internship next summer with the Gilchrist Center for Diversity in Montgomery County.  Thus, I have no regrets.  Topic selection was also hugely important because I needed to pick a topic that I knew I could commit to, based on previous experience.  The freedom in choosing a topic allowed me to think and take time with my decision, which was beneficial in the long run.

                One interesting thing that I learned during the documentary process was the extent to which the disabled are forced into Medicare, and the inhumane marrying for insurance, and lack of security of benefits.  The personal interviews helped me to truly realize this, and also dispelled any myths I had about disability healthcare.

                The biggest challenge that my group faced creating the documentary was integrating the B-Roll and Interview A-Roll into a cohesive product.  This challenge arose due to the lack of communication between me and Ravyn, when we were scripting each part of the documentary.  We tackled this challenged by first transcribing all of the A-Roll footage and looking at where our B-Roll or secondary research could add in more depth.  Thus, we integrated our extra B-Roll by using the A-Roll as a point of reference.

                If I had the chance to create another documentary, I would take more part in the interview part.  Finding diverse and dynamic interviewees is the key to a great jump-start in a subject-based documentary.  Although our interviewees were extremely informative and effectively passionate, playing a personal role in that process would’ve helped to become more involved with the overall process.

                In terms of what the teacher can do, I think less is more (to some extent).  Monitoring the students is GOOD, and honestly, it helps me stay on track.  However, I think the weekly planning half-sheets are a waste of time, and don’t really help the students organize their time (tasks and plans are often repeated).  Furthermore, I think it would be helpful to have a professional reference guide for technical errors/troubleshooting in Final Cut Pro, such that major mistakes (such as loosing footage) will be avoided.  Along with this, should come strict protocol for file management. A few final cut basics should be re-enforced in the beginning of the process.

                Overall, this was a FUN PROJECT! I would definitely do it again, and feel as if I can explore other documentary topics on my own, using the schools I have learned.