Freedom writers

I was just relaxing at home this afternoon, recovering from a fever, and decided to dig through the dvd collection at the house and came across “Freedom Writers”, I have briefly heard about it before but have never watched it. I skimmed the blurb and knew I had to watch it. 

A lot of thoughts went through my head during the movie. For a short description, Freedom Writers is about a woman’s first year of teaching at a school with students who are in the school because they are forced to. Very racially mixed and segregated and have no desire to study at all. The teacher struggles through the year and changes her methods of teaching the kids. What happens next? You’ll have to watch the movie. 

Erin (the teacher) struggles with the administration and her colleagues while trying to teach the kids the ways she knows how to. It pains me to see the way the administration reacts to these students, the way they believe these children and hopeless therefore, as a teacher, you are just “baby sitting” them because they have to be there. Erin, on the other hand, thinks differently.

Through her guidance and teaching, these students change drastically from a group of kids in gangs, and believes they are at war on the street… to a group of students who believes in change, who believes in doing the right thing and being as a family. 

Words are powerful. It doesn’t matter whether you are still a teenager, or whether you have got years of experience on the work field. Words can change people, change outcomes and even save a life. It’s one of the most powerful weapons in life. 

Perhaps that’s exactly the reason why I love writing, & expressing my feelings through words.