


































  

 

Urban Legends: 

Representing the Urban Teacher in Urban Teacher Film (1955-2007) 

 

Joseph Flynn, Carla Cooper Shaw, and Nina Dorsch 

Northern Illinois University 

 

Abstract 

 This study examines the trends in 

representations of urban teachers in urban teacher 

films from 1955-2007. Using a textual analysis 

(McKee 2005), ten films that focused on the lives 

of urban teachers were analyzed. The findings 

show clear trends and the development of a 

―grand narrative‖ about urban teachers and 

teaching. Understanding these trends and 

narrative can help challenge the assumptions 

preservice teachers have about urban teaching that 

result in avoiding those school contexts. 

 

Introduction 

Film possesses a psychological and 

political force, derived in part from its nature as 

visual stories and Western audiences’ 

conditioning to particular story structures, themes, 

and values (Shaw and Nederhouser 2005; 

Zavarzeduh 1991). The subconscious power of 

movies also comes from the vicarious experiences 

they provide (Bandura 2002; Author and 

Nederhouser 2005). Just as beliefs about teaching 

are often formed at a subconscious level during 

childhood, impressions about teaching may be 

developed subconsciously while viewing films, 

especially as represented across the genre of 

teacher films (Shaw and Nederhouser 2005).  

 The power of film has been harnessed as a 

teaching tool in teacher education (Dalton 1999; 

Giroux 1997). Film offers members of a teacher 

education course a common text and examples to 

critique, rather than sharing idiosyncratic stories 

from their personal and pre-professional lives 

(Trier 2001). Wrestling with a common text 

provides the opportunity for the whole class to 

reflect on personal experiences and assumptions 

about the nature of teaching and teaching in urban 

schools particularly (Grant 2002). Through film, 

students find that images of experiences and ideas 

will resonate and conflict with their own, and in 

the process of exploring these issues, students 

gain new insights about sociocultural and political 

issues, identity, pedagogy, and teaching practices. 

 Brunner (1994) used school films to offer 

preservice teachers stories with which to think 

about schooling in concrete ways. As she 

explains, ―Making a leap from abstraction to 

situation can be difficult without a bridge… 

[school films] can provide such a link and may be 

the key to making meaning‖ (p. 71). Trier (2001) 

also used school films to help preservice teachers 

consider the personal and professional lives of 

teachers. Using a combination of articles and key 

scenes from school films, Trier provided his 

students with experiences they otherwise were not 

able to have. Not only did this kind of 

engagement offer a common experience, it also 

facilitated his students’ understanding of a source 

of cultural myths.  As Trier put it, ―Their own 

images … were probably derived from having 

watched such films…‖ (p. 128). 

 Similarly Grant (2002) showed preservice 

teachers filmic representations of urban schools, 

as portrayed in Dangerous Minds (1995), Stand 

and Deliver (1988), and 187 (1997). Grant led her 

students in critically examining representations of 

urban teachers and schools in order to challenge 



 

85 

 

preservice teachers’ assumptions about teaching 

and learning in urban contexts. As she states: 

 

The stories in these movies, although 

they contain grains of truth about 

schools and teaching, also reflect and 

affirm many of the myths and distorted 

understandings that future teachers have 

about urban students, urban teachers, 

urban schools, and urban communities 

(p. 79). 

 

Grant’s observation highlights school films as a 

potentially influential source of cultural myths 

about urban teaching. 

The challenges of teaching in urban 

schools are many and well documented (e.g., 

American Federation of Teachers 2007; 

Fischman, DiBara, and Gardner 2006; Kincheloe 

2007; Marvin 2006; Smith and Smith 2006). 

Urban schools are often hard to staff with ―highly 

qualified teachers,‖ especially in discipline-

related shortage areas, such as special education 

and secondary math and science (Illinois State 

Board of Education 2005). So challenging is the 

role of the urban teacher that Haberman (1995) 

devised a STAR selection process based on 14 

functions of effective teachers in urban 

classrooms, including building relationships with 

students, approaching teaching with stamina, and 

remaining focused on student learning. These 

teachers are undaunted by at risk labels applied to 

students of color and poverty. With their success 

in urban classrooms, STAR teachers represent an 

ideal to which teachers might aspire. 

 More pervasive, and perhaps compelling, 

in the minds of potential urban teachers than the 

functions of STAR teachers are the cultural myths 

that shape teachers’ and society’s views of 

effective teaching (Britzman 2003). Britzman 

notes, ―Cultural myths provide a set of ideal 

images, definitions, justifications, and measures 

for thought, feelings, and agency that work to 

render as unitary and certain the reality it seeks to 

produce‖ (p. 222). That is, cultural myths are 

ideal images that are so pervasive they become 

expectations that are internalized.  The question is 

not necessarily whether or not these myths are 

true or false, accuracies or distortions, but the 

expectations they emit become sacrosanct in the 

minds of viewers and thus shape individual 

expectations about what teaching is and what it 

takes to be a good urban teacher. 

Britzman’s ethnography of preservice 

teachers uncovered three cultural myths that act 

as barriers to acquiring new knowledge and 

perspectives about teaching and learning: (1) 

everything depends on the teacher, (2) the teacher 

is an expert, and (3) teachers are self-made. These 

myths have informed prospective teachers’ 

notions of good teaching and are extremely 

resistant to change. The last myth, in particular, 

can be seen as having the most potential to 

influence would-be urban teachers. For the novice 

teacher, this cultural myth gives rise to a belief in 

―a kind of social Darwinism … in which only the 

strong survive‖ (p. 230). The myth of the self-

made teacher leads into the myth of the teacher-

as-hero (Marshall 2007), and these myths likely 

are furthered through popular film.  

How, then, do school films portray 

teachers in urban schools? This question guided 

the current investigation, the purpose of which 

was to identify trends, if any, in the portrayal of 

urban teaching. Under this guiding question a few 

other essential questions arose. Do the 

representations of the urban teacher follow a 

particular set of trends? What approaches to 

curriculum and instruction are largely evident in 

these films? What are the prevailing stories that 

are furthered through this genre of film? Because 

many pre-service teachers have seen these films 



 

86 

 

and the representations can sharply influence how 

individuals construct expectations, pedagogy, and 

practice, these questions merit examination. 

 

Method 

As teacher educators who teach courses 

about the representations of teachers in film and 

utilize film for cultural analyses in courses for 

pre-service and inservice teachers, we sought to 

conduct an analysis of trends in the ways 

filmmakers—and by extension moviegoers, 

including prospective and practicing teachers—

have represented urban teaching in the United 

States over the past half century. To identify 

trends, a text analysis was conducted.   

Text analysis, according to McKee (2003), 

is an appropriate method for seeking ―to obtain a 

sense of the ways in which, in particular cultures 

at particular times, people make sense of the 

world around them‖ (p. 1). In text analysis, a 

variety of documents, productions, and objects 

can serve as texts, so long as they are ―… 

something we make meaning from‖ (p. 4).  

Deciding the criteria for choosing films to 

examine was not as simple as one would assume. 

Although many films are set in schools, relatively 

few feature teachers in urban school contexts as 

the protagonists.  Filmographies constructed by 

Bulman (2005), Dalton (1999), and Nederhouser 

(2000) reveal that school films typically focus on 

the experiences of students, not teachers. Three 

criteria, consistent with the study’s focus on 

myths of urban teachers, guided the selection of 

films for analysis.  

First, the story must be set in an urban 

school. To qualify as urban, the setting must 

include customary images of the inner city, such 

as explicit indications of poverty in both the 

school and the surrounding community, such as 

dilapidated or burnt-out buildings, minimal 

resources, housing projects, and gang-related 

grafitti.  In representations of urban schools, 

students often, though not always (e.g., To Sir, 

with Love), are predominantly Latino and/or 

African American.  These attributes eliminate 

some movies which at first glance appear to be set 

in urban schools.  Teachers (1984), for example, 

contains images commonly associated with inner-

city schools—low achievement, chaotic 

classrooms, apathetic teachers, unruly students, 

incompetent administrators—but the students of 

Teachers and their community do not show clear 

indications of poverty.  Rather, Teachers, which 

was released one year after A Nation at Risk 

(National Commission on Excellence in 

Education 1983), satirized the lamentable 

condition of U.S. education, in general, in the 

1980s. If we were examining the general 

representations of teachers then Teachers would 

without doubt be a key selection; however, since 

this study deals specifically with the 

representations of urban teachers, there are no 

clear indications, based upon our criteria, that 

qualifies this particular film.   

Second, the protagonist must be a teacher, 

rather than an administrator, coach, or student. 

Finally, to reflect film’s potential to impact the 

development of cultural mythology, the movie 

must be a feature-length film rather than a 

documentary or film short. The texts included in 

this inquiry, listed by release date, include: 

Blackboard Jungle (1955), To Sir, with Love 

(1967), Up the Down Staircase (1967), Stand and 

Deliver (1988), Dangerous Minds (1995), 187 

(1997), Music of the Heart (1999), Half Nelson 

(2006), The Ron Clark Story (2006), and Freedom 

Writers (2007). 

 Text analysis took place in two broad 

stages. First, trends related to components of 

teacher identity and elements of story structure 

were identified. Then, based on the trends that 

emerged, a deeper narrative analysis was 



 

87 

 

conducted. Initial analysis of trends employed a 

version of text analysis similar to that used by 

Nederhouser (2000) in her analysis of 100 teacher 

movies. Nederhouser analyzed each film and its 

featured educators according to particular fields 

derived from a review of the literature related to 

images of teachers in film (e.g., Burbach and 

Figgins 1991; Burbach and Figgins 1993; 

Swetnam 1991) and categories that emerged 

during viewing. We agreed upon both a priori 

and emergent fields, basing our decisions for field 

selection on relevant literature (Burbach and 

Figgins 1993; Dalton 1999; Grant 2002; 

Nederhouser 2000; Swetnam 1992), extensive 

viewing of school films, and experience using this 

genre of films as a teaching tool. The a priori 

fields included: release date, ethnicity of teacher, 

ethnicity of students, gender of teacher, true story, 

and career stage. 

  After identifying a priori fields, we 

individually screened the ten films, taking notes 

and making preliminary conclusions related to the 

targeted fields. Then we engaged in lengthy 

discussions about the movies, closely comparing 

and contrasting our individual interpretations. We 

reached consensus regarding the analysis of each 

film and in so doing enhanced validity.  

According to Bernard (1994), ―Validity itself [of 

text analysis] depends on the collective opinion of 

researchers‖ (p. 43). During this deliberation we 

identified additional fields that were evident 

across all the films: approach change, epiphany, 

cost of teaching, and benefit of teaching. Figure 1 

shows all fields, both a priori and emergent—

with definitions, when needed, and coding 

options.

 

Figure 1: A priori and emergent fields—with definitions, when needed and coding options 

Field* Definition (if needed) Coding Options Qualitative Coding Options (if 

applicable) 

Release Date N/A N/A N/A 

Ethnicity of Teacher N/A African American 

Latino 

White 

N/A 

Ethnicity of Students N/A African American 

Latino 

White 

Mixed 

N/A 

Gender of Teacher N/A Female/Male N/A 

True Story N/A Yes/No N/A 

Career Stage N/A Neophyte/Veteran N/A 

Approach Change Teacher’s change in 

curriculum or pedagogy, or 

both, and/or in interaction, or 

relating to students based on 

caring and concern 

Yes/No Curriculum Approach 

 Intellectual traditionalism 

 Social behaviorialism 

 Critical reconstructionism 

 Traditionalism 

Interaction: varies 

Epiphany The moment that catalyzes 

insight on the teacher’s part.  

From this point forward the 

teacher responds in a markedly 

different way to students. 

Yes/No Varies 

Cost What the teacher loses  Yes/No Varies 

*A priori options italicized. 



88 

 

We were aware that many of the cinematic 

teachers underwent changes in their curricular 

approaches   ,and we wanted to explore those 

changes. Curriculum is a complicated, contested 

terrain with numerous approaches and strategies 

(Flinders and Thornton 2004; Pinar 1995). In 

order to see how curriculum and pedagogy play 

out on screen, Schubert’s approaches to 

curriculum (1996) was particularly helpful. He 

delineates four approaches to curriculum and 

instruction that are concise and helpful in thinking 

about the approaches utilized by cinematic urban 

teachers.  First, he posits the Intellectual 

Traditional approach. This approach is seen 

through an emphasis on the classics, intrinsic 

rewards, Socratic dialogue, and critical thinking. 

Next, he constructs the Social Behavioral 

approach. Measurement of learning, extrinsic 

rewards, and training in life skills mark this 

approach. The Experiential approach uses active, 

hands-on methods to connect student learning 

with their lives and communities. Schubert’s final 

approach is the Critical Reconstructionist 

approach. Critical interpretations of content, 

empowerment of oppressed groups, and libratory 

pedagogy are characteristic of this approach. We 

added a fifth approach, the Traditional approach, 

characterized by conventional content and 

methods, such as lecture and drill, as a sort of 

baseline approach typically seen in urban school 

films and reminiscent of the methods used in 

urban schools in the wake of No Child Left 

Behind (Darling-Hammond 2007; Neill 2005).

  

Any teacher can display a combination of 

these approaches at any time. How teachers’ 

approaches to curriculum are represented in film 

is no different. As a matter of fact, most of the 

teachers examined in the selected films displayed 

either a transition from one approach to another, 

or consistently displayed a combination of 

approaches. For example, Mr. Dadier of 

Blackboard Jungle (1955) began his teaching 

utilizing a staunchly traditional approach. As the 

film nears its climax his approach began to fuse a 

social behavioral approach with an experiential 

approach, as seen in Figure 2, which presents 

qualitative coding of the emergent fields. 

In the process of completing Figures 1 and 

2, predictions about trends arose. Once the 

matrices were complete, we began testing 

predictions by cross-referencing particular fields, 

as Nederhouser (2000) did in her analysis of 

trends. From this cross-referencing phase of the 

analysis process, findings regarding trends in the 

films’ depictions of urban teaching emerged. 

    A distinctive narrative structure became 

apparent in which the protagonists experience 

chaos, an epiphany, and then transformation. By 

virtue of its prevalence and persistence among the 

films under investigation, we came to see it as a 

dominant cultural discourse, a grand narrative, 

worthy of further examination. At this point, the 

second phase of text analysis began. Delving 

more deeply into narrative structure we uncovered 

significant trends in the representations of 

approach change, gender, race and ethnicity of 

teacher and students, career stage, and costs.  

 

Findings 
To derive the study’s initial findings, 

selected fields were cross-referenced, with 

combinations of fields constituting permutations. 

For each permutation, the field of Title was held 

constant. When a permutation yielded 50-60%, 

70-90%, or 100% of the movies under 

consideration, a moderate, strong, or very strong 

trend, respectively, was deemed to exist. The 

order in which the following permutations and 

their results are presented approximates the 

researchers’ process of discovery. 



89 

 

Figure 2: Data summary of qualitative coding options  

 

Title 

(Gender of 

teacher) 

Release 

date 

Approach Change* Epiphany Cost Benefit 

Blackboard 

Jungle 

(male) 

1955 Traditional>Social 

behavioral+Experiential 

Discovery of 

students’ 

robbery plot; 

discovery of a 

student’s 

musical ability 

Physical safety Discovery of teaching as 

true calling 

To Sir, with 

Love 

(male) 

1967 Traditional>Social 

behavioral+Experiential 

Discovery of 

sanitary 

napkin in 

furnace 

Dignity Discovery of teaching as 

true calling 

Up the Down 

Staircase 

(female) 

1967 Traditional>Experiential Discovery of 

how 

intimidating 

students can be 

 Personal 

relationships 

 Physical 

safety 

Discovery of teaching as 

true calling 

Stand and 

Deliver 

(male) 

1988 Experiential>Traditional Shock of the 

chaotic first 

day of class 

Physical health Vindication of methods 

Dangerous 

Minds 

(female) 

1995 Traditional>Social 

behavioral>Experiential+ 

Intellectual traditional 

Shock of the 

chaotic first 

day of class 

 Personal life 

 Money 

Discovery of teaching as 

true calling 

187 

(male) 

1997 Experiential Discovery that 

his watch has 

been stolen by 

a student 

 Relationships 

 Sanity 

 Life 

None 

Music of the 

Heart 

(female) 

1999 Curriculum: Traditional 

Interaction: 

Brusque>caring 

Discovery that 

student has a 

physical 

challenge 

None  Discovery of 

teaching as true 

calling 

 Personal salvation 

 Vindication of 

methods 

Half Nelson 

(male) 

2006 No substantive change None None Relationship with student 

as salvation 

The Ron 

Clark Story 

(male) 

2006 Curriculum: 

Traditional+Social 

behavioral+Experiential 

 

Interaction: 

Defensive>Vulnerable 

Girlfriend’s 

remark 

 Heath 

 Dignity 

 Vindication of 

methods 

 Romantic 

relationship 

Freedom 

Writers 

(female) 

2007 Traditional>Experiential Interception of 

student-drawn 

racist 

caricature 

 Marriage 

 Time 

 Money 

Discovery of teaching as 

true calling 

* (>) indicates a change. (+) indicates a combination of approaches. 



 

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Perception of Reality in Portrayal of Urban 

Teachers 

 Interested in the extent to which urban 

school movies may be seen as reflecting reality,  

we checked the permutation, Title x True Story. 

Five of the 10 movies are based on accounts of 

real teachers, suggesting a moderate trend. This 

trend is presented in Figure 3. This moderate 

trend is highly important because it offers 

legitimacy to the stories told and the images of 

urban teachers represented. Furthermore, it calls 

into question exactly what identities are in fact 

being constructed and do they actually reflect the 

reality of the teaching force today? 

 

Figure 3.  Trend: Perception of Reality in 

Portrayal of Urban Teachers 

 

Trend Strength 

(ratio: percentage) 
Movies portraying urban 

teachers are based on real 

teachers’ accounts. 

Moderate 

(5/10: 50%) 

 

Components of Teachers’ Identities 

We then investigated permutations 

pertaining to components of teacher characters’ 

identities. Title x Gender revealed that in 60% of 

the films, males portray teachers, suggesting a 

moderate trend. The reality of this is that female 

teachers are approximately 75% of the full-time 

teaching force (National Center for Educational 

Statistics 2009). The notion that most films 

portray the stories of men in urban teaching 

contexts further highlights urban schools as 

dangerous environments and plays to stereotypes 

of both place and gender. Although this may add 

drama, the stories of neophyte teachers struggling 

to find their way are even more compelling.  

Title x Career Stage yielded 70% of the 

movies as portraying neophytes, a strong trend. 

Arguably, Ron Clark—as a veteran teacher, but a 

neophyte urban teacher—fits the trend as well, 

thereby slightly strengthening it. With the 

exception of Music of the Heart, which also 

covers Roberta Gaspari’s later career, these films 

are devoted exclusively to teachers’ first years in 

urban classrooms. Title x Teacher Ethnicity 

identified 70% of films with teachers who are 

White, indicating a strong trend. 

To explore the relationship between 

teachers’ ethnic identities and those of their 

students, we checked Title x Teacher Ethnicity x 

Student Ethnicity. In 80% of the movies, teachers 

are of a different ethnicity than the majority of 

their students, indicating a strong trend. These 

movies are To Sir, with Love, Up the Down 

Staircase, Dangerous Minds, 187, Music of the 

Heart, Half Nelson, The Ron Clark Story, and 

Freedom Writers. With the exception of Mark 

Thackeray and his students in To Sir, with Love, 

these eight teachers are White and their students 

are of color, predominantly African American 

and/or Latino. Trends associated with 

components of urban teacher identity are 

presented in Figure 4. 

 

Figure 4.  Trends: Components of Teachers’ 

Identities 

 

Trend Strength 

Urban teachers are 

portrayed as male. 

Moderate 

(6/10: 60%) 

Urban teachers are 

portrayed as neophytes. 

Strong* 

(7-8/10: 70-80%) 

Urban teachers are 

portrayed as White. 

Strong 

(7/10: 70%) 

Urban teachers (White) and 

their students (of color) are 

portrayed as being of 

different ethnicities. 

Strong 

(8/10: 80%) 

* The ―strong‖ strength remains the same whether or not 

Ron Clark is included as a neophyte. 



 

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Approach Change and Epiphanies, Costs and 

Benefits 

Trends related to gender, career stage, 

teacher ethnicity, and student ethnicity highlight 

relatively static, immutable components of 

identity. To investigate whether teachers change 

as the stories progress, we checked Title x 

Approach Change. In eight of the 10 movies, 

teachers change their approaches, indicating a 

strong trend. Figure 2 summarizes the nature of 

these changes. Jaime Escalante in Stand and 

Deliver, for example, starts experientially. In the 

first teaching scene, he facilitates students’ 

understanding of fractions by cutting an apple 

with a butcher knife, and soon after he takes 

students on a field trip. Once he gets students’ 

attention through experientialism, he adopts a 

more traditional approach—goading students into 

chanting, ―A negative times a negative equals a 

positive,‖ and explaining how to solve problems 

on the board.  More often, a teacher hits on 

experientialism after traditionalism has failed. 

That is, the teacher who employs a banking 

method (Freire 2000), whereby the teacher sees 

students as depositories for the wisdom she wants 

to dispense, finds this approach to be 

unproductive, marginalizing the teacher from the 

class community. Louann Johnson in Dangerous 

Minds, for instance, starts traditionally with an 

unsuccessful attempt to get students to conjugate 

verbs. She soon moves to social behaviorism as 

she tosses candy to students who participate. 

When participation becomes the norm, she 

abandons this tangible reward. To students’ 

objections, she replies, ―Learning should be its 

own reward.‖ This pithy edict is a key tenet of 

intellectual traditionalism (Schubert 1996). To 

bolster the message, she engages students in the 

experientialist Bob Dylan-Dylan Thomas contest 

in which students experience the thrill of research 

and of finding reflections of their own lives in the 

poets’ words. At some point in the teachers’ 

development, usually later, experientialism comes 

to play a strong role, often in combination with 

other approaches. It is noteworthy that despite 

students’ impoverished backgrounds, teachers 

whose approach changes do not employ critical 

reconstructionist approaches which would 

encourage the students to challenge the social, 

cultural, and economic factors that shape their 

lives. 

 To explore what prompted changes, we 

considered epiphanies, or moments in which 

teachers experienced seemingly sudden insights 

that marked turning points in their approaches.  

Checking Title x Approach Change x Epiphany, 

we found that in all eight movies in which 

teachers change approaches, epiphanies take 

place, indicating a very strong trend (Figure 2). In 

most cases, these stimuli provoked teachers’ 

perception of their students’ humanity—the felt 

understanding of students’ reality and 

perspectives. For Erin Gruwell in Freedom 

Writers, who has tried approach after approach to 

little avail, insight comes with her interception of 

a student-drawn racist caricature. In To Sir, with 

Love, the moment arrives for Mark Thackeray, 

who has been struggling to maintain a temperate 

demeanor with his insolent students, when he 

discovers that students have put a sanitary napkin 

in the classroom furnace. 

As noted in Figure 2, Roberta Gaspari of 

Music of the Heart and Ron Clark of The Ron 

Clark Story do not change their approach to 

curriculum and instruction. They do, however, 

evidence change of another sort—how they relate 

to students. Soon after Roberta begins teaching 

violin she regularly teases and taunts her students. 

As she prods one little girl to stand up straight, 

Roberta pokes the student’s leg and discovers that 

she wears leg braces and has a physical disability. 

After this epiphany, Roberta’s approach to 



 

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interacting with students becomes more obviously 

caring. Comparably, Ron Clark, who has tried 

approaches that presumably worked in his 

previous school but are failing with his urban 

students, feels helpless in the classroom. A 

friend’s comment—―You feel helpless?  They feel 

that way everyday.‖—serves as an epiphany. 

Thereafter, he takes pains to make his own 

vulnerability apparent to his students. It can be 

argued that all teachers who change approaches to 

curriculum and instruction also change how they 

relate to students, and both changes contribute to 

positive outcomes. For Roberta Gaspari and Ron 

Clark, however, their changes in relating to 

students seem sufficient for transforming the 

trajectories of their stories. Leading up to their 

epiphanies, teachers struggle prodigiously—with 

themselves, students, fellow teachers, 

administrators, and other naysayers in their 

lives,–and must begin to weigh the costs of being 

urban teachers. To explore the costs paid by 

teachers as a result of devotion to career, we 

checked Title x Approach Change x Cost. The 

result indicates a strong trend, with 88% of the 

filmic teachers who evidence changes in approach 

paying substantial costs (Figure 2 and Figure 5). 

In Blackboard Jungle, for example, Rick Dadier’s 

physical safety is compromised when he is beat 

up by students. Louann Johnson of Dangerous 

Minds apparently has no time for a personal life, 

and she, like Erin Gruwell, pays out of pocket to 

enhance students’ learning opportunities. 

To further explore costs, now as they 

pertained to gender, we checked Title x Approach 

Change x Cost x Gender. Of the teachers who 

change approach, four are male and four are 

female, and most pay substantial costs. On the 

surface, then, no trend emerged regarding 

differential costs paid by male and female 

teachers. Figure 3 reveals that males and females 

tend to pay different kinds of costs. Three of the 

four male teachers experience threats to their 

physical health or well being: Rick Dadie of 

Blackboard Jungle is attacked by students, Jaime 

Escalante of Stand and Deliver suffers a heart 

attack, and Ron Clark comes down with 

pneumonia. Throughout their travails, these men 

enjoy the affection and support of significant 

others.  In contrast, each of the three female 

teachers takes a hit in their personal lives, and 

they take it without the support of romantic 

partners. Sylvia Barrett of Up the Downstair Case 

and Louann Johnson of Dangerous Minds have 

no scenes whatsoever suggesting personal lives 

unrelated to school. Freedom Writers contains 

scenes of Erin Gruwell’s personal life, but she 

begins her first year of teaching with a husband 

and ends it without him. Because three, or 75%, 

of the male teachers under consideration 

experience costs associated with physical health 

and well-being, a strong trend is indicated. 

Because three, or 75%, of the female teachers 

under consideration pay costs related to their 

personal lives, a strong trend is indicated. Roberta 

Gaspari of Music of the Heart, unlike the other 

three female teachers, does not pay a cost to her 

personal life due to devotion to teaching. On the 

contrary, her immersion in teaching appears to 

provide an escape from romantic entanglements 

and their potential for failure, and her relationship 

with her sons continues to grow. 

What, we wondered, do teachers gain 

from their struggles and sacrifices? What is the 

pay-off?  To explore benefits, we checked Title x 

Approach Change x Cost x Benefit. The result 

indicated a very strong trend, with all seven 

teachers who change approaches and pay 

substantial costs also gaining substantial benefits, 

which are summarized in Figure 2. If Roberta 

Gaspari, who does not pay a substantial cost, is 

taken into account by checking Title x Approach 

Change x Benefit, a very strong trend emerges, 



 

93 

 

with all eight teachers gaining significant 

benefits. The major benefit for six of these eight 

teachers is the discovery of teaching as their true 

calling, indicating a strong trend. Jaime Escalante 

and Ron Clark appear already to have arrived at 

this conviction, but they do find vindication of 

their controversial methods by story’s end. In 

both cases, vindication comes in the form of 

students’ scores on standardized tests. Ron Clark 

gains an additional benefit—a girlfriend who 

seems won over largely by his devotion to his 

students. Roberta Gaspari finds personal salvation 

in teaching and like Escalante and Clark, finds 

vindication of her contested methods. For her, 

vindication comes with the success and expansion 

of her music program. Trends related to 

approaches, epiphanies, costs, and benefits appear 

in Figure 5. 

 

Figure 5.  Trends: Approaches and 

Epiphanies, Costs and Benefits 

 
Trend Strength 

Urban teachers are portrayed as 

changing approaches, favoring 

experientialism. 

Strong 

(8/10: 80%) 

Urban teachers who change 

approaches are portrayed as also 

experiencing epiphanies. 

Very Strong 

(8/8: 100%) 

Urban teachers who change 

approaches are portrayed as 

paying substantial costs. 

Strong 

(7/8: 87.5%) 

Urban male teachers who change 

approaches are portrayed as 

paying costs related to physical 

health and well being. 

Strong 

(3/4: 75%) 

Urban female teachers who 

change approaches are portrayed 

as paying costs related to their 

personal lives. 

Strong 

(3/4: 75%) 

Urban teachers who change 

approaches and pay substantial 

costs are portrayed as gaining 

substantial benefits. 

 

Very Strong 

(7/7: 100%) 

Trend Strength 

Urban teachers who change 

approaches are portrayed as 

gaining substantial benefits. 

Very Strong 

(8/8: 100%) 

Urban teachers who change 

approaches are portrayed as 

discovering teaching as their true 

calling. 

Strong 

(6/8: 75%) 

 

The Emergence of the Grand Narrative  

 Prompted by the consideration of 

approach change and the related fields of 

epiphany, cost, and benefit, we turned our 

attention to story structure. A particular and 

repetitive story arc began to materialize, initially 

termed Story Arc 1. Story Arc 1 hinges on the 

interaction between cycles of teacher perception 

and student reaction. That is, initially the teacher 

is a push-over, totalitarian, or clearly afraid. 

Students react with mistrust, resistance, and 

rebellion, and the teacher comes to see the class 

as an unruly, uncontrollable mob. The teacher’s 

struggles are punctuated by an epiphany, which 

leads her to view students as individuals with 

unique needs; consequently, her approach 

changes. Once students perceive that the teacher 

respects them, they respond in kind. The teacher 

nurtures a respectful classroom culture and a 

learning community coalesces, one that supports 

dramatic improvement in student learning. In 

essence, the teacher’s perception and students’ 

reactions become interdependent; their energies 

feed off each other, creating a positive feedback 

loop. Stimulated by an epiphany, the process of 

change entails costs for most teachers and 

benefits for all. Checking Title x Story Arc we 

ultimately found that 80% of the films follow 

Story Arc 1, indicating a strong trend. Only the 

films 187 and Half Nelson diverged from Story 

Arc 1.   

To flesh out Story Arc 1 as it relates to 

components of teacher identity, we checked Title 



 

94 

 

x Story Arc 1 x Gender. Of these eight films, four 

portray male teachers and four portray female 

teachers. At first glance, the data seem to suggest 

a trend toward even portrayal of male and female 

teachers within Story Arc 1. However, by looking 

at the whole pool of 10 movies, different trends 

emerge.  Of the stories of the six male teachers in 

all 10 films, four, or 67%, follow Story Arc 1, 

suggesting a moderate trend. Of the stories of the 

four female teachers in all 10 movies, all, or 

100%, adhere to Story Arc 1, indicating a very 

strong trend.   

Further fleshing out Story Arc 1 with 

regard to teacher identity, we checked Title x 

Story Arc 1 x Career Stage. Of the eight films, 

seven portray teachers as neophytes, indicating a 

strong trend. If Ron Clark also is considered to be 

a neophyte in an urban school context, then the 

trend becomes very strong. As indicated in Figure 

2, the two veteran teachers, Trevor Garfield of 

187 and Dan Dunne of Half Nelson, do not 

change approaches with the majority of their 

students.  

Looking at teachers’ ethnicity within 

Story Arc 1, we checked Title x Story Arc 1 x 

Teacher Ethnicity. In the eight movies 

conforming to Story Arc 1, six of the teachers are 

White, indicating a strong trend. To investigate 

the relationship between teachers’ and students’ 

ethnicities within Story Arc 1, we checked Title x 

Story Arc 1 x Teacher Ethnicity x Student 

Ethnicity. In six of the eight films, teachers’ 

ethnicities are different from the majority of their 

students’, indicating a strong trend. These movies 

are To Sir, with Love, Up the Down Staircase, 

Dangerous Minds, Music of the Heart, The Ron 

Clark Story, and Freedom Writers.  Trends 

related to the prevalence of Story Arc 1 and 

components of teacher identity appear in Figure 

6. 

Because approach change with epiphanies 

is the pivot on which Story Arc 1 turns, it is 

logical to assume that the trends identified for 

teachers whose approach changes also apply to 

teachers whose stories conform to Story Arc 1; 

these teachers are one and the same. Our 

assumptions were confirmed.  Trends related to 

structural elements of Story Arc 1 are presented 

in Figure 7 on the next page. 

 

Figure 6.  Trends: Prevalence of Story Arc 1 

and Components of Teacher Identity 

 

Trend Strength 

Stories of urban teachers are 

portrayed as following Story 

Arc 1. 

Strong 

(8/10: 80%) 

Stories of urban male 

teachers are portrayed as 

following Story Arc 1. 

Moderate 

(4/6: 67%) 

Stories of urban female 

teachers are portrayed as 

following Story Arc 1. 

Very Strong 

(4/4: 100%) 

Urban teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as neophytes. 

Strong / Very Strong * 

(7/8: 87.5% / 8/8: 100%) 

Urban teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as White. 

Strong 

(6/8: 75%) 

Urban teachers, whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1, 

and their students are 

portrayed as being of 

different ethnicities.  

Teachers are White; students 

are of color, predominantly 

African American and 

Latino. 

Strong 

(6/8: 75%) 

*  The ―very strong‖ strength reflects Ron Clark’s inclusion 

as a neophyte. 

 

 

 

 

 



 

95 

 

Figure 7.  Trends: Structural Elements of 

Story Arc 1 

 

Trend Strength 

Urban teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as changing 

approaches. 

Very Strong 

(8/8: 100%) 

Urban teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as 

experiencing epiphanies. 

Very Strong 

(8/8: 100%) 

Urban teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as paying 

substantial costs. 

Strong 

(7/8: 87.5%) 

Urban male teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as paying 

costs related to physical 

health and well being. 

Strong 

(3/4: 75%) 

Urban female teachers 

whose stories follow Story 

Arc 1 are portrayed as 

paying costs related to their 

personal lives. 

Strong 

(3/4: 75%) 

Urban teachers, whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

and who pay substantial 

costs, are portrayed as 

gaining substantial benefits. 

Very Strong 

(7/7: 100%) 

Urban teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as gaining 

substantial benefits. 

Very Strong 

(8/8: 100%) 

Urban teachers whose 

stories follow Story Arc 1 

are portrayed as discovering 

teaching as their true 

calling. 

Strong 

(6/8: 75%) 

 

Perception of Reality in Portrayal of Urban 

Teachers Whose Stories Follow Story Arc 1 

At this point, we returned to our interest in 

the extent to which these movies may be 

perceived as conveying the reality of urban 

teaching—this time, with regard to Story Arc 1. 

By checking Title x True Story x Story Arc 1, we 

found that all five movies based on real teachers’ 

stories fit within Story Arc 1, indicating a very 

strong trend. Our hypothesis about the persistence 

of Story Arc 1 was confirmed by checking Title x 

Release Date x Story Arc 1. Results reveal that 

over time, Story Arc 1 has proven robust.  For 

over half a century—from Blackboard Jungle in 

1955 to Freedom Writers in 2007—Story Arc 1 

has provided the structure for eight of the ten 

films, indicating a strong trend. Figure 8 presents 

trends related to the perception of reality in 

portrayals of urban teachers whose stories follow 

Story Arc 1. 

 

Figure 8.  Trends: Perception of Reality in 

Portrayal of Urban Teachers Whose Stories 

Follow Story Arc 1 

 

Trend Strength 

Stories based on real 

teachers’ accounts follow 

Story Arc 1. 

Very Strong 

(5/5: 100%) 

Over time, Story Arc 1 

provides the structure for 

portrayals of urban 

teachers. 

Strong 

(8/10: 80%) 

 

Conclusion 

 The prevalence of Story Arc 1 across 

films and across time suggests a sort of grand 

narrative that may serve as a source of cultural 

myths or urban legends, potentially shaping the 

ways preservice teachers, and the general public, 

perceive the reality of urban teaching. In this 

reality, urban teachers’ personal struggles hover 

around issues regarding the struggle to make time 

for family and self, health, personal safety, and 

determining whether or not they really want to do 

this job. Urban teacher images are consistently 

juxtaposed against contexts that are seemingly 

insurmountable. They address issues like 

violence, teen pregnancy, low academic 



 

96 

 

achievement, and uncooperative, uncaring 

parents—issues rarely dealt with in suburban 

school films (Bulman 2005; McCarthy et. al. 

2004).  

 The urban teaching context is depicted as 

a dead end of depravity that causes the viewer to 

feel much more enthralled by the seemingly 

superhuman teachers.  In effect, the grand 

narrative may contribute to the reluctance to teach 

in urban schools because pre-service teachers 

look at the accumulation of images furthered 

through the grand narrative and wonder if they 

have the stuff to hack it. While discussing the 

films, we often questioned how many of our 

students, who are largely White, middle-class 

females, have no desire and even a fear of 

teaching in urban schools. The representations 

furthered through the grand narrative, without a 

vigorous critique, are difficult to see around. 

Grant (2002) points out teachers in such films 

more often than not are constructed as saviors 

who are the center of learning, deeply involved 

with students’ personal lives, naturally 

authoritative, more enlightened than parents, and 

all-sacrificing for students and the profession.  

Her point is that the films do not 

adequately portray the complexity of urban 

teachers and schools, and they ―disregard the 

powerful political, economic, and social forces at 

play‖ (p. 85) in those contexts. Keser (2007) in a 

spot-on review of Freedom Writers argues: 

 

Despite its compassion for kids born 

into situations they didn’t make and the 

dog-eat-dog struggles happening on their 

doorsteps, the movie keeps mum when it 

comes to the real culprits—the brutal 

economic outlook for underclass 

members plus the systematic crippling of 

public education via underfunding. The 

untoward sympathy for the heroine plays 

badly next to its scant concern for the 

students’ need to support themselves in 

dead-end McJobs, nor is there much sign 

of behavioral pitfalls like drug and 

alcohol abuse (or even cursing).  

(Retrieved November 17, 2009) 

 

The reality of teaching in urban high schools, any 

high school for that matter, is that teachers teach 

multiple classes and can engage upwards 100-120 

students daily. Clearly, the heroic actions of 

teachers in this genre are simply unsustainable as 

represented (Keser 2007), especially since these 

teachers operate largely in isolation from their 

colleagues and have little experience with 

pedagogy and practice. 

The grand narrative represents many 

truths about teaching in urban contexts: 

repercussions of poverty, violence, inept 

administrators, naysaying careerist colleagues, 

progressive methods, etc. However, films of the 

grand narrative largely focus on the power of 

singular, heroic individuals in the interest of 

driving story and drama. Again, this is especially 

difficult since many of these stories are based on 

real teachers.  The cultural myths that pervade the 

grand narrative, as Briztman (2003) pointed out, 

create expectations for the uninitiated that foster a 

sense of fear and loathing about teaching in urban 

contexts while never actually showing what a 

typical day looks like from the perspective of real 

(rather than reel) teachers, nor do these films 

show how teachers create coalitions of like-

minded professionals for ideas, support, and 

action. Moreover, the grand narrative eclipses 

stories of teachers, administrators, and parents 

(i.e. communities) who work together to bring 

change in challenging contexts for all students 

and not just a few in one class.   

As Moore (2007), a teacher in New York 

City, cautions in another critique of Freedom 

Writers, ―… the most dangerous message such 

films promote is that what schools really need are 



 

97 

 

heroes.  This is the Myth of the Great Teacher‖ 

(p. 1). Uninitiated in the real world of urban 

teaching, pre-service teachers likely interpret 

these films as portraying reality, given the very 

strong trend that all five films based on real 

teachers’ accounts follow Story Arc 1 (refer to 

Figure 3). Whether these dramatized accounts are 

perceived to be myth or reality, the grand 

narrative has proven compelling to moviegoers 

and profitable for moviemakers.  

In Moore’s reference to the urban teacher 

as hero, we find a hint of the reason behind the 

grand narrative’s appeal. The mythical hero’s 

journey, then, warrants further examination. In 

addition, the story structures of the two films in 

this study that do not conform to the grand 

narrative are worthy of exploration—for they 

possess potential as counter narratives that can be 

equally as powerful and insightful as the grand 

narrative.  

 

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