Freedom Writers Essay

The ‘Freedom writers’ is a movie which embodies the story of an English class in an urban long beach high school. Directed by Richard LaGravenese and produced by, Danny DeVito , Michael Shamberg and Stacey Sher, the ‘Freedom writers’ is based on the struggle of a new teacher, Mrs. Gruwell, to maintain an ambitious environment in her class room. Her tolerance, trust and respect is not taken for granted as she climbs success alongside her students in the hopes of taking them out of their misery and showing them a life to live and look forward to. As part of Mrs. Gruwell’s struggle, she is faced with a group of students whose lives revolve around war, gangs, violence and protecting their own. Her racially opposing students most often choose to be a part of the epidemic which now governs the school. Yet, Mrs. Gruwell takes on the challange to defeat the odds. She realizes that these kids are looked down on because of their race and as a result they rebel and create borders among themselves. These ‘mini territories’ are created to bring a sense of equality among those of the same race. Overcoming adversity, family relationships, inequality in education, success and goal setting is what Mrs. Gruwell aims to have instilled in those around her. A theme which surfaces in the movie is that of Mrs. Gruwell’s courage. How would one react if they were placed in such a troubled school setting away from the safe environment that they are used to? Mrs. Gruwell had the courage to take on the task of helping those to pursue their goals. Her never ending attempts to teach the ‘unteachables’ and her desire to help her students succeed are inspiring. Her attempts to relate with so many of her different economic, cultural and racial students took a lot of courage. Another difficult challenge for Mrs. Gruwell was to teach students who were at war with each other.