The video is a short, testimonial‑style recruitment clip featuring five speakers (A–E) who describe their experiences with Freedom School. Speaker A emphasizes that every activity is intentional and creates joy for the kids. Speaker B explains the daily “Harambee” motivational song that starts each morning and reflects on how the experience builds transferable skills for any career, especially in human resources. Speaker C, a site coordinator, details the extensive responsibility of overseeing all classes, lesson plans, and field trips, highlighting multitasking and leadership growth. Speakers D and E share their academic backgrounds (sociology, human services, business) and how the program offers practical experience that complements their studies and future career aspirations. Across the speakers, there is a strong focus on a reading‑centric, social‑justice‑oriented curriculum, inclusion, and the empowerment of youth. The participants describe the impact they have on younger students, the sense of community, and recommend the program to anyone interested in education‑related fields such as teaching, law, medicine, or leadership, positioning Freedom School as more than a summer camp—a purposeful learning environment.
Chapters
Everything in Freedom School has a purpose and is very intentional, and I feel like the kids feel those intentions, and it definitely promotes joy here at Freedom School.
We did Harambee every morning in training, singing the motivational song. It's full of just affirmations about ourselves and kind of starting our day off well.
I'm used to managing a classroom, but now I manage a site and I manage every single class. I have to know what's going on. What lesson are we doing today? What field trips? So I'd say as a site coordinator, you learn a lot of responsibility and kind of like multitasking at once.
I'm a sociology major and I have a minor in human service studies. I just knew this would give me the experience and also be not just a learning experience for them, but for me as well.
I'm in school right now. I just transferred to the business school at my school, but teaching has always been something that's like in the back of my head, something I may want to do.
I want to go into a career in human resources. I have friends that are like in finance or they're in business and they have internships where they're like at an office desk or they're doing stuff. And they're getting paid, they're having a good time, but I feel like this experience is something that regardless of what job I go into, I've learned something here that's going to be able to transfer to every aspect of my life.
I definitely think this can appear just like a summer camp, but there's definitely a huge emphasis on learning and the importance of reading. Specifically in like the material and content that they choose to focus on is more important. I think has a like greater meaning in terms of social justice and the importance of learning about different people and different cultures and communities.
The first week they were kind of like, I don't really want to read. But as we got more into it, I have students who volunteer to read every single day. I don't have a boss to fear.
Say my brother.
So as an SLI, I say that our job is really just to make sure that they understand the importance and they understand that they can make a difference no matter what age they are and no matter where they come from.
I love that we are for inclusion. I love that we have a big justice piece built into our curriculum, and I think a lot of our SLIs probably have those They can relate to that as well.
That's one thing that I think has kind of stuck out to me, the amount of impact and just kind of influence that I can have on so many younger people.
I would recommend this to anybody that wants to be a teacher, a principal, a lawyer, a doctor. I think everybody needs experience working with our youth and also learning what it's like to educate, because I think education goes beyond the classroom.
I just say I look forward to coming back next year.
