The Freedom Writers Diary summary

In 1995, right before what would be her second year as a full teacher at Wilson, Gruwell almost switched schools. Some of the other teachers bullied and judged her for her unorthodox teaching methods, and the attention she and her class had got in the media, not to mention from famous names like Steven Spielberg. But when her principal asked her why she was leaving, she realized she needed to stay for her kids. Besides, she realized, not all the teachers thought badly of her, and she’d just spent a year teaching her kids about tolerance and the dangers of generalizing.

The sophomore year of her initial English class focused on books about teens in crisis, including The Diary of a Young Girl, by Anne Frank; and Zlata’s Diary: A Child’s Life in Sarajevo. The students considered peer pressure and how the desire to fit in and be popular could lead themselves and others to do things they knew were wrong and wouldn’t have done on their own. For example, one teen was constantly hearing their friends brag about the “loot” they’d shoplifted. The teen decided to try it themself but was caught. They reflected on the pain and embarrassment they caused both themself and their parents because of peer pressure, and resolved not to give in to it again.

As Gruwell headed into her original students’ junior year in the fall of 1996, she wasn’t sure how she would top all the wonderful things that had happened the previous year. But she was determined to make American literature just as engaging as the world literature they’d studied before.

Gruwell chose a theme for her class during the 1996–1997 school year. It was to be self-reliance. The students considered what it meant to be self-reliant, and how they could approach situations by taking control of themselves and their actions. They started to choose not to engage in fights that happened in front of them, and even started feeling guilty for not trying to stop the fight, even when doing so would have likely gotten them beaten up.

Gruwell had another fight on her hands as senior year approached. As only a fourth-year teacher in a school that favored seniority in terms of which teachers got to teach which classes, it wasn’t guaranteed that Gruwell would be able to keep her original class of students for their senior year. Fortunately, this changed after receiving support from the district superintendent, Dr. Carl Cohn. She would now be able to teach her class throughout their final year.

Gruwell focused much of her efforts the school year of 1997–1998 on helping her graduating seniors plan for college and beyond. Many of the students would be the first high school graduates in their families and had never thought they’d attend college. Few of them had enough support at home to make it through the complicated process of applying. In response to this, Gruwell set up a nonprofit organization to raise funds for applications and tuition. In addition, she assigned graduate students she was teaching at National University to each mentor two Freedom Writers.