TWYH Final Chapters

After Gruwell lost the election, she was in a financial debt. She found ways to make extra money by traveling around and giving presentations and speeches about her experiences with the freedom writers. Throughout these trips, she got to meet famous people such as Rudy Giuliani, and Hank Aaron. She also made connections with people that were able to help her out. One of those people was Ric Kanye, who was so impressed with what she had done with her students that he wanted her to create an exact replica of her teaching model that she used with her students. So that her students could help her create the model, as well as get some college credits, Kanye offered to pay for half a dozen of the students tuition. While celebrating during the fundraising party for the start of the program, Gruwell ran into an old friend whose husband was a movie producer. This lead to another opportunity for the Freedom Writers, a movie was going to be produced based on their stories. In the middle of all this happening, Gruwell’s father dies. He had just seen his first speech by her, and called her to tell her how proud he was of her, when he died later that day. Gruwell struggled at first, though she continued to do her work. She found the Freedom Writers helpful during the coping process. The book ends with Hillary Swank playing the part of Gruwell in the movie, and Darius and Maria giving speeches before the kickoff of the highly anticipated move Freedom Writers.
I really enjoyed reading this book, and would have to say that it is probably one of my favorites now, but I have mixed feelings about the ending. Its frustrating reading about how Gruwell put all this time into teaching, and the only thing left for herself is a divorce and no money. I think its great what she has done for her students, and all the experiences she has had, can never be matched, but I hope that in the end she was able to have her own personal life. I thought there were to many times at the end that she did not seem happy, and I think it would have been a lot easier on her if she had more of a support system other than her dad, and had time to slow everything down. I do not know whatever happened with the work that she was doing for Ric Kanye, but I thought that was good for her. That’s something I could see her enjoying and being successful at.
After the students had graduated, I wished Gruwell had spent less time discussing congress and her speeches, and more talking about what the students are doing now. I thought it was necessary to talk about what she did, because it all connected and showed how they got to where they are now, but I did not feel that she needed to go into that much detail. I am curious on hearing how there all doing. In the end, I am very appreciative of what Gruwell has done. She has not only sacrificed her time and energy for her students, but also future teachers like me who are able to learn from her experiences and ideas.