Freedom Writer Maria Reyes will be the keynote speaker tomorrow at 6 p.m. for the Anti-Defamation League’s 27th Annual Governor’s Holocaust Remembrance Program in the Boettcher Concert Hall in the Denver Center for the Performing Arts.
Reyes was a third-generation gang member by the age of 7 and spent her teenage years in and out of detention centers.
In 1994, she was attending Woodrow Wilson High School in Long Beach, Calif., but had yet to read an entire book.
Along with her classmates, she was labeled “un-teachable and below average.”
The class was a diverse group consisting of African-American, Latino, Cambodian, Vietnamese and Caucasian students, many of whom had grown up in rough neighborhoods.
After the class was required to read The Diary of Anne Frank, her teacher, Erin Gruwell, realized that many of her students had not heard of the Holocaust.
With inspiration from Anne Frank’s story, Reyes and her classmates began to share their own stories through anonymous journals.
These journals allowed them to deal with their own prejudices and led them to question their own stereotypes.
Reyes and her class became a successful group of young students when their journal entries were published as The Freedom Writers Diary and then made into a movie in 2007 by Paramount Studios called “Freedom Writers.”
“The book is written in diary format. One hundred fifty freedom writers wrote their stories about the experiences in room 203 with Erin Gruwell,” said Sue Ellen Alpizar, who works for the Freedom Writers Foundation.
The name “Freedom Writers” comes from the civil rights activists dubbed “Freedom Riders.”
Reyes went on to earn her bachelor’s degree from California State University, Long Beach in 2005. Reyes now travels across the country speaking to teachers, at-risk youth and community leaders to share the impact that Holocaust education has had on her life.
“She travels around the country to communities that request her to speak about her experiences as a Freedom Writer, provide inspiration to others and really spread the Freedom Writers message of hope to communities,” said Alpizar.
The free program will also include a speech by Gov. Bill Ritter Jr., a candle-lighting ceremony memorializing the victims of the Holocaust and an opportunity to honor Colorado survivors in attendance.
This is one of the events of Holocaust and Genocide Awareness Week which is hosted by the DU student organization Never Again!
The week of events promote awareness and understanding of the Holocaust and subsequent genocides as well as how to take action against current and future genocides.
