Teaching Hope

by THE FREEDOM WRITERSGRUWELL, ERIN

• ISBN13: 9780767931724
• ISBN10: 0767931726
• Edition: Original
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2009-08-18
• Publisher: Broadway Books

Summary

There are lives lost in this book, and there are lives saved, too, if salvation means a young man or woman begins to feel deserving of a place on the planet. . . . What could be more soul-satisfying? These are the most influential professionals most of us will ever meet. The effects of their work will last forever.o ufrom the foreword by Anna Quindlen Now depicted in a bestselling book and a feature film, the Freedom Writers phenomenon came about in 1994 when Erin Gruwell stepped into Room 203 and began her first teaching job out of college. Long Beach, California, was still reeling from the deadly violence that erupted during the Rodney King riots, and the kids in Erin's classroom reflected the anger, resentment, and hopelessness of their community. Undaunted, Erin fostered an educational philosophy that valued and promoted diversity, tolerance, and communication, and in the process, she transformed her students' lives, as well as her own. Erin Gruwell and the Freedom Writers went on to establish the Freedom Writers Foundation to replicate the success of Room 203 and provide all students with hope and opportunities to realize their academic potential. Since then, the foundation has trained more than 150 teachers in the United States and Canada. Teaching Hope unites the voices of these Freedom Writer teachers, who share uplifting, devastating, and poignant stories from their classrooms, stories that provide insight into the struggles and triumphs of education in all of its forms. Mirroring an academic year, these dispatches from the front lines of education take us from the anticipation of the first day to the disillusionment, challenges, and triumphs of the school year. These are the voices of teachers who persevere in the face of intolerance, rigid administration, and countless other challenges, and continue to reach out and teach those who are deemed unteachable. Their stories inspire everyone to make a difference in the world around them.

Author Biography

Erin Gruwell is the Founder and President of the Erin Gruwell Education Project, a non-profit organization that funds scholarships for disadvantaged students and promotes innovative teaching methods.

Excerpts

FOREWORD
ANNA QUINDLEN

Any columnist who makes sweeping generalizations is looking for trouble, but I once did just that in an essay I wrote forNewsweek.“Teaching’s the toughest job there is,” I said flatly, and the mail poured in. Nursing is tough. Assembly line work is tough. Child rearing is tough. There were even a few letters with some of those old canards about the carefree teacher’s life: work hours that end at 3 p.m., summers at the beach.

I imagine that the people who believe that’s how teachers work don’t actually know anyone who does the job–if they did, they would know that classes may end at 3 p.m., but lesson planning and test correcting go on far into the night, while summers are often reserved for second jobs, which pay the bills. But I’m lucky enough to know lots of teachers, and that’s why I stuck by my statement. More important, I’ve taught a class or two from time to time, and the degree of concentration and engagement required–or the degree of hell that broke loose if my concentration and engagement flagged–made me realize that I just wasn’t up to the task. It was too hard.

But if hard was all it was, no one would ever go into the profession, much less the uncommonly intelligent people who, over the years, taught me everything from long division to iambic pentameter. I don’t remember much at this point in my life, but I remember the names of most of the teachers I’ve had during my educational career, and some of them I honor in my heart almost every day because they made me who I am, as a reader, a thinker, and a writer.

So when I first read about Erin Gruwell and the Freedom Writers, it came as no surprise to me to discover that the truth about teaching was that it was sometimes a grueling job with near- miraculous rewards, for students and for teachers alike. In Erin’s first, internationally known book,The Freedom Writers Diary,you saw this mainly through the eyes of her high school students, young men and women living with combative families, absent parents, gang warfare, teenage pregnancies, and drug abuse. Above all, they lived with the understanding that no one expected them to do anything–not just anything great, but anything at all. They’d been given up on by just about everyone before they even showed up in class.

Except for Ms. G, as they called her, who was too inexperienced and naïve to get with the surrender or the cynicism program. Her account of assigning her students to write candidly about their own lives and thereby engaging them in the educational process, of how many of them went on to college and to leadership roles in their communities, is a stand-up-and-cheer story. That’s why it was turned into a movie, and why Erin’s model has now been replicated in many other schools.

That first book contained the stripped-bare writings of those students, but in this one, it’s the teachers’ turn to give the rest of us a window into how difficult their job can be. In a way I never could, they answer the naysayers who question the rigor of their jobs. Here are the real rhythms of a good teacher’s life, not bounded by June and September, or eight and three, but boundless because of the boundless needs of young people today and the dedication of those who work with them. These are teachers who attend parole hearings and face adolescents waving weapons, who teach students they know are high or drunk or screaming inside for someone to notice their pain. “Sitting at the funeral of a high school student for the third time in less than a year” is how one teacher begins an entry. There are knives and fists, and then there is the all-too- familiar gaggle of girls who are guilty of “a drive-by with words,” trafficking in the gossip, innuendo, and nastiness that have been part of high sch

---

Excerpted from Teaching Hope: Stories from the Freedom Writers Teachers by Erin Gruwell, The Freedom Writers
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.