Aboard a sinking 'Scholar' ship
ABC's new reality show, which pits bright young students in a contest for a full scholarship, is tawdry, exploitative and tedious.
By CHASE SQUIRES
Published June 6, 2005
It's difficult to imagine a more distasteful premise for a television show than that of ABC's The Scholar. There's something about the exploitation of children - toying with their future, making them cry and feel unworthy, dangling a whiff of underage sexuality - that doesn't sit well.
If anyone was wondering what it would take to push the reality show genre too far, The Scholar's premiere offers a hint.
The setup: Ten hard-working, smart, engaging young people need money to go to college. Make them dance through competitions, spill their guts and agonize over their futures for entertainment.
Then let a panel of supposed professionals decide which young person is deserving of a $250,000 scholarship. As host Rob Nelson tells viewers in the opening, "Their dreams of the perfect college just out of reach, only one thing stands in their way: the money. Ten high school seniors, one full-ride scholarship."
In case you didn't get it: "They've all got the brains, but not the means, to go to their school of choice," Nelson says.
Ohhh. Got it! Let's find out how desperate they are (wink, wink)!
One contestant, a 17-year-old identified as Max from Oakland, Calif., reflects the angst the show feeds on.
"There's a lot of negativity in Oakland, drugs, gang warfare," Max tells the camera. "I believe that college is my only way out of it."
Max sounds like he's trying to overcome pretty serious problems. But never mind his 4.0 grade point average - let's see how far he'll go to get to college.
Like other reality game shows, contestants compete in team and individual challenges (although in this case, they are brain teasers instead of physical challenges, because apparently you can't be smart and physically fit), winners get rewards, people say nasty things about each other to the "confessional cam" and then a team of adults on the "scholarship committee" votes one of them off.
On the committee are real college admissions professionals who should have a little more respect for themselves and the students. Two were smart enough to save their university the embarrassment of being named in such a tawdry production, but Marquesa Lawrence of the University of California, Berkeley, not only admits her connection, but the school's public relations office also wrote up an interview with her and put it on the Internet.
"I would like the effect (of The Scholar) to be that (college) is possible, that "where there is a will, there is a way,' " Lawrence said in the interview. "Many students and parents give up on their dreams once they see the cost of college or the paperwork involved before they really research the process."
Apparently, instead of giving up their dreams, students should humiliate themselves on television.
Richard Wong, executive director of the American School Counselors Association, hadn't seen the show yet but listened to the premise.
The message, he said, sounds off. Instead of explaining financial aid, scholarship and grant programs, it creates a false sense of desperation.
"It does seem to be a bit misleading to say that the only way they could find funds for college is through something like this. It does sound a bit exploitive," Wong said. "In this day and age, money should never be a barrier. If you're smart enough to get into Yale, you're smart enough to find the funding. The characterization that some people would have to give up their dreams of going to college because of money is wrong."
Russ Sabella, past president of the counselors group and a professor at Florida Gulf Coast University, said the other part of the premise - one must go to college to have a successful life - is equally harmful.
"I have a doctorate, and I have a brother who went to art school. He makes a whole lot more than I do," Sabella said.
And something's missing . . . a sex angle?
"College is about more than just academics, college is also about social awakening," Nelson says in the introduction. Viewers hear one of the young women a moment later say, "You're just plain sexy."
All five of the young women, and eight of the 10 competitors, are under 18.
Watching one of the young women discuss bumping into someone with her breasts feels sleazy. The camera zooms in on another one of women's bare legs as she giggles.
And on top of all its failings - making a young, smart woman cry and say, "I feel stupid"; making the 17-year-old son of Vietnamese immigrants agonize about losing a $50,000 bonus prize by missing a quiz question; taking advantage of children - The Scholar commits one more sin.
It's astoundingly boring.
The entire first episode takes place on a modern, urban college campus, so it's as visually compelling as a walk through a government building. The challenges are things like cryptograms and quizzes on literature. The "dramatic" climax looks like a teacher conference.
It's all kind of like sitting through high school.
Man, when's the bell going to ring?
Chase Squires can be reached at 727 893-8739 or squires@sptimes.com
PREVIEWThe Scholar premieres tonight at 8on WFTS-Ch. 28.