The Freedom Writers Diary is an amazing and true story that helps provoke change to racial discrimination. The story begins with the Freedom Writer's amazing leader Erin Gruwell. As a new teacher to the school system in Long Beach, she is looked down upon and is given the "at-risk" students to teach. On the first day of her student's freshmen year, they are not too excited to be in Ms. Gruwell's class, and they don't appreciate her enthusiasm whatsoever. As time went on, Ms. Gruwell soon learned that all the students are subjected to violence on a regular basis, and they all go through their own undeclared war. Many feel like outside their classroom walls, they are susceptible too danger, violence, and abuse. After realizing this, Ms. Gruwell introduced them to many books with stories similar to their own. This list included Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl and Zlata's Diary: A Child's Life in Sarajevo. The students were able to connect to these young teenagers, and they created their own diaries to express the emotions that each one of them felt. The Freedom Writers grew to become an extended family that managed to stay in the same class with Ms. Gruwell all four years of high school. The kids who had been labeled "at-risk" and "unteachable" had some of the highest grade point averages come senior year. Everyone who wasn't in Ms. Gruwell's class wanted in because of all the fascinating things they did. The arranged for Miep Gies, the woman who helped hide Anne Frank in the secret annex, to come to their school. They paid for Zlata's trip to their school to meet this modern day Anne Frank. They went to Washington D.C. to spread their message of tolerance to adversity. The Freedom Writers even went to New York to accept The Spirit of Anne Frank Award. These teens had done what seemed to be the impossible. Each of the 150 Freedom Writers and their leader, Ms. Gruwell, learned that the first step of making change requires only one tool: a pen.
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