What was your first aim when you decided to study as a teacher?

I wanted to give a voice to the voiceless.

How did you get to Room 203?

I chose to be an English teacher as a response to the Los Angeles riots following the Rodney King Verdict. At the time, I as living in Newport Beach, an affluent seaside community of California, but I chose to teach in a community that was directly affected by the riots. Wilson High was in transition: many students were being bused in from housing projects; many students had lost friends due to the rise of gang violence. Startlingly enough, there were 126 murders in Long Beach the year before I began teaching.

What were your first feelings and emotions when you first entered Room 203?

Trepidation, fear, a feeling of insecurity, and a can-do spirit that was my driving force to overcome all obstacles.

What was your first impression of the students and the obstacles they faced?

I was a little naïve to the situation before me. I was a young, fresh teacher who was incredibly excited to be in her first classroom. However, I soon became overwhelmed by the differences that my students and I seemingly had. I felt sad for my students because their lives were so dramatically different than my own. Many of them came from housing projects, lived with a single parent, had experienced poverty, and had lost loved ones, and so school was not a priority for them. They had no hope and thought, for the most part, that the world had given up on them. I was overwhelmed with how to change their views and to let them know that they had a chance and someone did care for them. I also knew that I wouldn’t give up on them. I was determined not to quit and was determined to instead find a means by which to reach these kids.

Where did your inspiration come from to help the students?

My inspiration came from a note that was passed around my class that was making fun of an African American student. When I compared that note to the Holocaust propaganda, my students didn’t even know what the Holocaust was. It was truly a teachable moment when we connected the dots of the realities between the Holocaust and the gang violence that my students personally knew. If we don’t teach history, we are bound to repeat it and I wanted to teach my students to know about the history that they were unknowingly repeating. I believe in the golden rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Since education has the ability to be the greatest form of equality, I wanted my students to have the same advantages in life that I had.

Was that what motivated you to continue on that course despite the difficulties?

Fortunately, I believe that every kid has a story and the most important thing for me to do is to help them to tell their story—to encourage them to put down their fist or that spray can or that gun and pick up a pen. Once my students began to write their story, they realized that they could rewrite their ending.

How did you come up with the idea that students have a life diary?

I chose to use books written by, for and about kids who lived in wars, such as Anne Frank, Elie Wiesel and Zlata Filopovic (a young diarist from Bosnia and Herzegovina) in a response to a comment by a Freedom Writer: “Sometimes, I feel like I live in an undeclared war.” I wanted to encourage my students that the best way to fight that war was through words and not weapons.

Who was inspirational for you at that moment? What was it that made you feel you were going to be able to change your students’ lives?

I was heavily inspired by the young man who stood in front of a tank in Tiananmen Square, which happened while I was going to college. I thought if someone had the courage and conviction to stand up for what they believe in, then maybe I could stand up to adversity and discrimination.

What is most rewarding about your work?

My reward has been seeing the Freedom Writers succeed.  I have watched them accomplish so much over their years, and today they are still an inspiration to me. I also get that same sense of reward when I’m teaching educators how to deal with the same obstacles that I did. Helping teachers connect with their students on an emotional level is truly the most rewarding experience.

I understand your father was a civil rights activist. How did he influence your work?

My father always taught me to fight for the underdog regardless of race, economics, gender, or sexual orientation, and I have tried to honor those principles my entire life.

How did the other members of your family influence you?

In addition to the work my father did, my entire family chose to enter professions that help others: my mother is a nurse; my sister is a teacher; and my brother works in politics fighting for those in underserved communities.

What sacrifices do you think you made?

I sacrificed a lot for my students: financially, socially, emotionally, and so on. However, if I had it to do over again, I would make all of the same sacrifices.

When you were teaching the Freedom Writers, what was your lowest point and what was your emotional peak?

My lowest point was when my husband and I decided to get divorced because he did not support my involvement with my students. My highest point was graduation day when all of my students graduated in spite of the odds.

Discrimination has never been as dooming in school classes as it is today. It cuts across not just gender, social class, and ethnic group lines, but also another person’s physical characteristics. What can we do to change that, not only as teachers, but also as parents?

Tolerance and acceptance were the cornerstones of every lesson plan that I ever did and what I learned immediately was that you had to be calculated and aggressive in doing so, because it’s easy for people to retreat to their comfort zones and segregate others. So, as a teacher or parent, you have to fight that urge and be very active in demonstrating the power of inclusion.

You wrote The Freedom Writers Diary Teachers’ Guide, and in it you describe a three-stage process. Can you explain this and tell me why it is important?

I believe to reach every student you must engage them, enlighten them, and, most importantly, empower them. So, with every element of my curriculum we followed those three steps.

What was the importance of the red tape?

The line game was an opportunity for my students to step on the red tape and physically demonstrate where they stood on certain elements and thus proving to everyone we are much more similar than we are different.

If you could repeat the Freedom Writers process every year, what would be the differences?

We are trying to repeat the magic of Room 203 by teaching teachers that we affectionately refer to as the Freedom Writer Teachers to do what I did by having an actual game plan in place before they do it. And we have found that most of these teachers have far-surpassed even my wildest expectations.

Which persons are important to you as role models for young people? Why?

I believe that Anne Frank is an iconic figure because she immortalized her story and, in doing so, has given a voice to so many kids who also have a story to tell.

You did follow some of your students through college. How was this experience, how many are following your steps or working in the Freedom Writers Foundation?

We created a cohort that included California State University Long Beach (the university where I was a professor) and approximately 30 Freedom Writers who then went through a bachelor’s degree program that we created specifically for them. Most of those 30 Freedom Writers are actively engaged in teaching the teachers that come to our institute, and several Freedom Writers have continued on as educators, as well.

What was your feeling when they decided to make a movie about you and your work?

I was honored that they wanted to make a film but also very cautious, because at its core our story deals with inequality and the effects of racism, which is a very dramatic subject matter, and so the story had to be told accurately and with dignity in order to have a lasting impression on its audience. Therefore, it was very important for me to be a partner in the process.

How is your life now? What do you do? Family, last book you write, projects, new challenges…

I currently work for the Freedom Writers Foundation where I do approximately 100 presentations each year across the globe. I also train teachers to follow in our footsteps, through the Freedom Writers Institute. Recently, I helped to collaborate on a new book written by the Freedom Writer Teachers, entitled Teaching Hope: Stories from the Freedom Writer Teachers, which was published in 2009. 

You think that tolerance is not enough, that what we need is acceptance? How can we reach that new challenge?

There’s a beautiful saying that one of the Freedom Writers coined: “When diverse worlds come together, beauty is inevitable.” So, I feel it’s very important to continue to promote diversity and the beauty that truly is inevitable when we collaborate.

What is the best lesson you have learned and from whom?

The best lesson I ever learned was from Miep Gies, the humble and courageous woman who hid Anne Frank for two years, who told my students, “I simply did what I had to do, because it was the right thing to do.” It is my hope that in the face of adversity that I can simply ‘do what I had to do, because it was the right thing to do.’

What is the best advice you can give a teacher?

My best advice was given to me from a Holocaust survivor who became my teacher. After surviving Auschwitz and living to tell her story, Renee Firestone challenged my students that: “Evil prevails when good people do nothing.” Therefore, as good people, we are compelled to do something.

What do you think should change in the educational system?

I believe that teachers should teach to a kid and not to a test.

What are the objectives of the Freedom Writers Foundation?

When we originally started the Freedom Writers Foundation, we wanted to have a way to collect the proceeds from The Freedom Writers Diary and distribute it to the Freedom Writers, so they could pay for higher education. Eventually, the objective of the foundation grew into something even more powerful. We believe the adage, “Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, feed him for a lifetime." Following in those footsteps, we believe in teaching educators how to empower their students so that they can be “fishermen for life.” Now, we have three programs: the Freedom Writers Scholarship for Wilson High School students who are the first in their families to graduate; a Freedom Writers Speakers Bureau that enables the original Freedom Writers to speak to incarcerated youth, classrooms, and schools around the world; and the Freedom Writers Institute where, together, we train educators to engage and empower their students.

How many members does the Freedom Writers Foundation have?

We have a very vibrant staff, many of whom are Freedom Writers, and more than 200 Freedom Writer Teachers.

How many copies of the book have been sold?

There are well over a million copies internationally in print, in eight languages: English, Korean, Japanese, Spanish, Mandarin, Italian, Greek, and German. We are hopeful that many more languages are to follow.

In the film, Freedom Writers, it was said that royalties from the book were donated. Is that true?

The proceeds from the book were used for scholarships to put the Freedom Writers through college. Now, the royalties from the book help students from Woodrow Wilson High School go to college and follow in the footsteps of the Freedom Writers; also, all of the educators who attend the Freedom Writers Institute receive a scholarship to come to Long Beach to train under myself and the Freedom Writers.