Business screen magazine (1946)

CALDWELL OF CANADA Jyisiribulors of — • SYNDICATED TV FILMS • TV AND FILM EQUIPMENT lir CIO Unions Increase Use of Audio-Visual Techniques President Walter Reuther Tells National Convention ACTIVE FILM DIVISION SERVES NATIONWIDE CLIENTELE M CIO unions are making increased use of audio-visual techniques to present current issues to their members, according to CIO President Walter P. Reuther's report to the recent CIO convention. Two major distribution projects conducted by the CIOs Film Division are outlined in the report. In cooperation with the Political Action Committee of the CIO, the Film Division distributed 30 prints of the new film. You Can Win Elections, produced by Roosevelt University. This film stresses the importance of citizen participation in ward and precinct work and outlines the jobs that must be done to get out the vote. Concerned witli These Issues The Film Division also publicized the new Canadian Film Board picture. The Shop Steward. A number of previews throughout the country were arranged and. as a result of this and other promotion, many CIO groups have bought or rented the film which examines the handling of grievances. "CIO use of films in the past year has reflected general national concern with international issues and civil liberties," said George Guernsey, CIO associate director in charge of education, in commenting on Reuther's report. "We have added a number of outstanding 16mm documentaries on these subjects, made by the UN and other documentary film makers, and they have been widely used at union meetings, classes and conferences. Our films on day-to-day union problems have also continued in demand." Used in Teaching Sessions The past year showed an increasing use of films as part of carefully planned teaching sessions led by CIO stafT people, according to Guernsey: "One education director built a two-hour session for fulltime union organizers and servicing staff around the film How to Conduct a Discussion, .\fter showing the film, he handed out a list of the main points, the group discussed them fully, then saw the film again. ".\nother staff person reported particular interest in Freedom to Read when he asked the head of the city's public library to attend the showing at a local union conference. Her contribution to the discussion which followed the film not only pointed up its implications locally but also encouraged cooperation between the library and union groups on future programs." Such use of films is common at many schools and conferences run by national CIO and by its various international unions. All groups using films are urged to follow them with group discussion, Guernsey said. Pamphlets, posters and discussion guides are provided to encourage this. Textile Film Is Popular Bookings from teachers, colleges and community groups constituted about one-fifth of CIO film rentals. Of the labor films rented by these non-labor groups. Union at Work, a film showing the varied activities of the Textile Workers Union of America-CIO and Local 100. made by the National Film Board of Canada to show how a union is organized, have been widely used during the past year. Twenty-five titles and 5.5 prints were added to the CIO Film Library last year. The library now contains 21 titles on union problems. 30 on international affairs. 24 on domestic issues. 12 on problems of discrimination, 10 on political activity, five on farm-labor cooperation, four on leaching techniques, and 29 for use as entertainment. Titles on Civil Liberties To give local unions a-v materials which "deal with the problem of McCarthyism" and the Bill of Rights, the CIO has been circulating three documentaries on civil liberties. Widely used were: the Freedom House film which features the debate between Edward R. Murrow and Senator Joseph McCarthy; Freedom to Learn, produced by the National Education .Association, which shows a teacher being tried for teaching about communism; and Freedom to Read, a new film sponsored by the American Library .Association, showing an attempt to censor books available from the public library. .\mong other films added to the CIO librarv recently are World Without End. a 45minute UNESCO documentary; School and Community, a cartoon showing their interlelalionship; Farewell to Oak Street. dealing with the human costs of poor housing: Neighbors, an Academy Award short on tolerance; Mr. (continued on page sixty-six) 64 BUSINESS SCREEN MAGAZINE