Curriculum Center: DVDs Depicting Schools & Teachers

A high school slacker who's rejected by every school he applies to opts to create his own institution of higher learning, the South Harmon Institute of Technology, on a rundown piece of property near his hometown.

When Jenny, a bright young school girl who longs for adulthood, meets David, a dashing older man, he introduces her to his vibrant world of glamorous friends, and chic jazz clubs. Will she let this affair ruin her dreams of attending Oxford, as her headmistress fears?

Elizabeth Halsey is a foulmouthed, ruthless, and inappropriate teacher. She drinks, gets high, and can’t wait to marry a meal ticket to get out of her bogus day job. When she’s dumped by her fiancé, she sets her sights on a rich, handsome substitute.

In a forgotten but defiant bayou community cut off from the rest of the world by a sprawling levee, a six-year-old girl exists on the brink of orphanhood. Buoyed by her childish optimism and extraordinary imagination, she believes that the natural order is in balance with the universe until a fierce storm changes her reality.

He's the heir to the Madison Hotel millions but in order to win his father's respect, and his Fortune 500 company, grown-up goof-off Billy must repeat all 12 grades of school - in just 24 weeks!

Glenn ford enters an inner-city school that is experiencing the effects of gang violence. Sidney Poitier also stars in the film, but he's on the other side of the classroom, this time playing one of the school thugs.

They were five students with nothing in common, faced with spending a Saturday detention together in their high school library. At 7 a.m., they had nothing to say, but by 4 p.m. they had bared their souls to each other and become good friends.

From Sundance Award-winning filmmaker, Lee Hirsch, comes a beautifully cinematic, character-driven documentary following five kids and families over the course of a school year. Offering insight into different facets of America’s bullying crisis, the stories include two families who have lost children to suicide and a mother awaiting the fate of her 14-year-old daughter, who has been incarcerated after bringing a gun on her school bus.

"Butterfly" ("Mariposa" in Spanish) is a Spanish film set in 1936, in the pre-stages of the Spanish Civil War.
This film brings together Moncho (a young boy), his family, his village and its politics, and an aging school teacher, who only wants to teach that everyone should live free.

This is a "mockumentary" that chronicles the plights of several teachers and administrators over the course of one school year. Very authentic performances which are enhanced by the students in the film and their very real behaviors.

You'll want to root for "Children in America's Schools", on this journey through our nation's public schools. Revealing the savage inequalities in American public education, you will watch and wonder about the future of our nation's public schools and the future of our nation.

Based on the hit Broadway play, it's the uplifting love story of John Leeds (William Hurt), an idealistic special education teacher, and a headstrong deaf girl named Sarah (Marlee Matlin). At first, Leeds sees Sarah as a teaching challenge. But soon their teacher/student relationship blossoms into a love so passionate it shatters the barrier of silence that keeps them apart.

This delightfully funny holiday gem tells the story of Ralphie Parker (Peter Billingsly) a 1940's nine-year-old who pulls out all the stops to obtain the ultimate Christmas present.

Samuel L. Jackson plays the controversial high school basketball coach who benched his undefeated team due to their collective poor academic record in 1999.

Michelle Pfeiffer is excellent as real-life, former marine, Louanna Johnson. Teaching English in a tough inner-city school, she reaches the "unteachable" through caring and understanding. Very true-to-life, Dangerous Minds teaches us about the importance of making our own choices.

A film of spellbinding visual beauty and brilliant resonant performances, Julie Dash's Daughters Of The Dust has become a landmark of independent film. With great lyricism, Daughters tells the story of a large African-American family as they prepare to move North at the dawn of the 20th Century.

Robin Williams gives an awesome performance as an unconventional English teacher in a very conventional private school. His love of poetry and his inspiring teaching methods have a great impact on his students.

Based on Ethan Canin's short story "The Palace Thief", this film depicts an idealistic prep school teacher who struggles to redeem an incorrigible student.

Linda is a forty-year-old unmarried high school English teacher in the small town. She shares a small apartment with two cats and her rich collection of great literature.
But Linda s simple life changes when former star pupil Jason returns to town after failing as a playwright in New York. Pressured by his overbearing father, Jason may be forced to give up his dreams and go to law school. Unwilling to let that happen, Linda mounts his play at her school with flamboyant drama teacher Carl, and puts her own reputation and teaching career on the line.

This film is one of the most realistic portrayals of life as a teacher. It depicts how people treat others and the ways that our decisions and choices always have consequences, whether fearful and negative, or positive and joyous.

Based on the novel by Ray Bradbury, this film centers on Montag, a regimented fireman whose job it is to burn books. Suddenly he finds himself a hunted fugitive forced to choose between personal safety and intellectual freedom.

Follow the heartaches and triumphs of a group of talented students as they struggle to graduate from New York's prestigious High School for the Performing Arts.

Sean Penn leads an all-star cast in this hilarious portrayal of a group of Southern California high school students and their most important subjects: sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.

"Bueller? Bueller?" Sorry, not here! Instead, high-schooler Ferris Bueller, his girlfriend Sloane and his best bud Cameron (Alan Ruck) are off on the spontaneous romp through Chicago known as Ferris Bueller's Day Off. So, barf up a lung, forge a "sick note" from the parents, and tag along on the funniest adventure to ever sweep through the Windy City. What are you still doing here? Save Ferris

Sean Connery plays a great, reclusive writer (possibly inspired by J.D. Salinger) who offers guidance to a young, developing writer.

A deceptively simple documentary, The First Year follows five teachers in California through the first year of their teaching careers. The teachers are a diverse lot, teaching different ages and classes at five different schools, but what remains consistent are the difficulties they face and the determination they bring to it.

Hilary Swank plays real-life teacher, Erin Gruwell who takes on freshman English at Woodrow Wilson High School in Long Beach, California. The school is racially diverse, but it is not well integrated. Gruwell proves to be naive and out of her element, yet her dedication to finding a way to reach her troubled students in inspirational and moving.

This documentary captures the ways greedy developers, inept politicians and self-serving community leaders can run rough shod over the lives of working class families fighting to save the 14-acre urban farm that has become the very source of survival and sense of community.

Matt Damon, who created and wrote the script with costar Ben Affleck, gives a star-making performance as a working class genius with a chip on his shoulder. Will Hunting is a janitor at MIT who has an extraordinary gift for mathematics. With the friendship and help of his psychologist, played by Robin Williams, Will discovers a new way to approach life.

Denzel Washington directed and stars in the film about professor Melvin B. Tolson of Wiley College in Texas. Set in the 1930s, the film focuses on how he formed the school's first debate team and managed to challenge prejudices to get his team to face off with Harvard University.

A powerful, award-winning film about an inner-city junior high school teacher with a drug habit who forms an unlikely friendship with one of his students after she discovers his secret.

In Camden, the elementary school teacher, Poppy Cross, is a very optimistic thirty year-old smiler that has been sharing a flat with her friend and co-teacher, Zoe, for ten years. When her bicycle is stolen, Poppy decides to have driving lessons with the Axle School of Motoring with the rude, bigoted and bitter instructor, Scott.

Westerburg High School’s elite clique of popular girls is “The Heathers,” comprised of the powerful Heather Chandler, the green-with-envy Heather Duke, and the cowardly Heather McNamara. Rounding out the foursome is Veronica Sawyer, who is so fed up with the Heathers and the entire peer pressure cooker that she starts running with J.D., a mysterious – and possibly psychotic – motorcycle-riding newcomer.

Richard Clark has just left the well-known Wellington Academy to teach at Marion Barry High School. Now, he will try to inspire the D-average students into making good grades and try to woo a fellow teacher.

From award-winning playwright Alan Bennett comes this delightfully witty comedy of eight boisterous-yet-talented schoolboys hoping to gain admittance to England's most prestigious universities. They're aided on their quest by two teachers, a shrewd young upstart and an inspiring old eccentric, whose opposing philosophies challenge the boys to confront the true meaning of education and the relative values of happiness and success.

A classic tale of redemption, this film features a volatile coach and a former star player-turned alcoholic leading a small-town basketball team on an improbable run to the Indiana high school championship game

Lee Mun Wah demonstrates how to create a sense of community in the classroom, how students can get to know each other more personally, and how classroom check-ins can promote a deeper understanding and friendship with one another. He also demonstrates how to deepen classroom discussion within minutes, as well as how to mediate conflicts between students.

A former student who's now a superstar actor tells an audience of millions that Howard is gay. Poor Howard. He's outed when he didn't know he was in! Kevin Kline plays stunned Howard, scrambling to go forth with his wedding to devoted Emily and doing his frantic best to assert his manliness.

While not normally thought of as a "classroom" movie, this film teaches us that sometimes we have our students do things in order to understand them, and themselves, in new ways later on.

Morgan Freeman plays Joe Clark, the real-life bat-wielding principal whose goal was to bring discipline and learning to Eastside High School in New York. While he was not always the easiest on the teachers, he stressed the importance of discipline and learning.

Ishaa is an 8 year old whose world is filled with wonders that no one else seems to appreciate; colors, fish, dogs, and kites are just not important in the world of adults, who are much more interested in things like homework, grades and neatness. Ishaa just cannot seem to get anything right in class. When he gets into far more trouble than his parents can handle, he is packed off to a boarding school to be disciplined. Things are no different at his new school, and Ishaa has to contend with the added trauma of separation from his family. A new art teacher infects the students with joy and optimism and breaks all the rules of how things are done by asking them to think, dream and imagine.

Told through the stories of one of the original "Little Rock Nine" as well as present day students at Little Rock Central High School, the HBO Documentary Film Little Rock Central High: 50 Years Later is an eye-opening look at how much - and how little - racial equality and education have changed in the 50 years since the school was the center of the Integration Crisis of 1957.

For four Harlem children winning the lottery means access to a top education and a future. Losing means being trapped in some of the worst schools in the country.

Based on Isabelle Holland's novel, this film tells the story of Chuck. He wants to leave home but can't make the grade for boarding school. Then Chuck finds out the disfigured recluse living nearby is an ex-teacher.

The heat-warming story of a little girl who discovers she is a genius. Matilda has the most wonderful teacher as she struggles to cope with her miserable parents.

The ultimate teaching miracle, Anne Bancroft plays Annie Sullivan who uses tough love to get through to Helen Keller and teach us about perseverance.

Julia Roberts stars in the film about a free-thinking art professor teaches conservative 1950s Wellesley girls to question their traditional social roles.

This memorable movie gives all teachers hope that they truly have an impact on their students. Richard Dreyfuss is wonderful as a musician/composer who must take a teaching job to support his family.

This film shows the influence that one person's drive and vision can have on others. Meryl Streep plays real-life Roberta Guaspari who move to Harlem as a single mother and becomes a violin teacher. Working through racial barriers, Roberta creates an acclaimed music program in an area where many would have said it was impossible.

Notes on a Scandal is a gripping, captivating story of two lonely women and the ragged way they fall in and out of love. Sheba, a young art teacher, who falls into a torrid affair with a 15-year-old student, ostensibly because of the disappointment and difficulties in her family life. Then Barbara, an older history teacher, who takes Sheba under her wing--or so she thinks-- is the first to know her secret.

Expecting only the basic pressures of attending Harvard Law School, a serious, hard-working student finds himself the fearful adversary of the school's most imperious, sarcastic professor. Their relationship grows even more complex when the boy discovers that the girl he's in love with is the professor's daughter.

A young boy attempts to make the world a better place after his teacher gives him that chance.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower tells the story of high schoolers coming of age and coming to terms. Though it enters some dark emotional territory as freshman Charlie connects with a clique of older students.

A touching, true life story of a coach/teacher and a student with special needs who teaches his coach and school even more than they thought possible.

This true life story tells the story of two segregated schools/teams learning how to deal with the issues that face them in 1970.

Danny Devito performance as a teacher is both humorous and inspiring. By proving to his students that Shakespeare still has much to teach them, Bill Rago shares with us important life lessons about responsibility and character.

Set in early 20th century rural Montana, this is the coming-of-age story of the author and his brother Paul, sons of a Scottish Presbyterian minister who raised them with both love and sternness and instilled in them, more than anything else, an understanding for the divine beauty of their land, symbolized by and culminating in a fly fisherman's skill in casting his rod, and his ability to become one with the river in which he fishes.

This movie tells the story of Ron Clark, a teacher who taught an inner city elementary school located in Harlem in the late 1990s. Clark gets the attention of his students by learning to Double Dutch and fosters a secure, respectful classroom environment using clear rules which he later detailed in his book "The Essential 55".

Max Fischer, a 15-year-old is attending the prestigious Rushmore Academy on scholarship, where he's failing all of his classes but is the superstar of the school's extracurricular activities (head of the drama club, the beekeeper club, the fencing club...). Possessing boundless confidence and chutzpah, as well as an aura of authority he seems to have been born with, Max finds two unlikely soulmates in his permutations at Rushmore: industrial magnate and Rushmore alumnus Herman Blume and first-grade teacher Rosemary Cross

After receiving a scholarship to an exclusive prep school, working-class teen David Greene becomes a star athlete and wins the attention of a beautiful debutante. But the ties of his new found friendships are broken when a student reveals the secret David has tried to conceal--he is Jewish. Now David must take the most important stand of his life, one that will touch the lives of many and forever change the course of his future.

Josh Waitzkin is just a typical American boy interested in baseball when one day he challenges his father at chess and wins. Showing unusual precocity at the outdoor matches at Washington Square in New York City, he quickly makes friends with a hustler named Vinnie who teaches him speed chess. Josh's parents hire a renowned chess coach, Bruce, who teaches Josh the usefulness of measured planning.

When a worldly singer witnesses a mob crime, the police hide her as a nun in a traditional convent where she has trouble fitting in.

It's Samantha Baker's Sweet Sixteen and no one in her family remembers the important occasion.. She's your average teen, enduring creepy freshmen, spoiled siblings, confused parents and the Big Blonde on Campus who stands between her and the boy of her dreams. But wait...the day isn't over yet!

SPELLBOUND follows the lives of eight young Americans who share one goal: to win the National Spelling Bee. Think this sounds boring? The Bee is as intense a competition as any Olympic match, and for the spellers and their families, the stakes are just as high. The unbearable pressure becomes even more extraordinary as it is felt by ordinary teenagers.

It's time for a major mid-term crisis in this darkly humorous and thoughtful comedy. Professor Charlie Thurber loves to teach, but can't stand all the expected publishing and politicking that goes along with the position. So when his opportunity for tenure is announced, he goes out on a limb to prove his worth, but unexpectedly finds himself falling for the very person who might replace him. It's a battle of the brains where the stakes are high and only one person can get an "A" for effort.

Sidney Poitier stars in this film as an engineer who takes a teaching position in the rough part of London as a way to pay his bills. Realizing that his students need to be taught important life lessons more than just the curriculum, he throws out the lesson plans and truly impacts their lives.

Sports columnist Mitch Albom has found success and popularity, but emotionally and spiritually he is bankrupted. After finding out that his old professor is battling amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, he visits Morrie and begins discussing issues such as happiness, life and death. In his final moments with Morrie, Mitch learns some of life's greatest lessons.

No hope. No future…until a football season united a team and revealed the character that turned them into heroes. UNDEFEATED, an Academy Award® winning documentary, , is the inspiring and moving tale of three underprivileged student-athletes from inner-city Memphis and the volunteer coach, Bill Courtney, trying to help them beat the odds on and off the field.

This film is a testament to the critical importance of having good teachers. This documentary displays the amazing effects that good teaching can have on a large population of students. But just as good teaching can save lives, bad teaching can destroy them.

Two determined mothers­, one a teacher, look to transform their children's failing inner city school. Facing a powerful and entrenched bureaucracy, they risk everything to make a difference in the education and future of their children.