TWYH - pg. 141-176

Abstract:
This section of the book starts out with Erin getting a divorce from her husband. They hadn't been getting along for awhile now, and he didn't even want to go on vacation to Europe with her. He left at the beginning of Erin's students junior year, so it was pretty touch on Erin. One thing that I didn't expect was that Erin's husband was seeing another woman. I don't believe this happened in the movie. Another part of the book that surprised me was that Erin's students found out that her husband was seeing another woman. A couple of her students actually worked at her husband's office with John Tu and saw him kissing the other woman. Her students responded by wanting to either beat him up or trash his car. Because of this, Erin had to come clean with her students that she was getting a divorce.

Another big part of this section of the book was that Erin organized a trip for all of her students, and she has 150, to go to Washington DC on a field trip. They wanted to go give their book to the Secretary of Education. For a lot of Erin's students, this was the first time they left California, stayed in a hotel, and rode on an airplane. It cost a lot of money to send that many people across the country on a field trip, and I'm still not really sure how Erin pulled it off.

Reflection:
"Maybe if I had poured my passion into being the perfect wife instead of the perfect teacher, we'd be admiring the Dutch canals together." After I read this, I just wanted to scream "Why hadn't you thought of this earlier?!" I'm not saying that she had to be the perfect wife, but if she put a quarter of the time she spent on her students into her marriage, they might still be together. I couldn't imagine letting my profession ruin a marriage. But I feel that Erin and her husband getting a divorce is just going to make Erin even more of a workaholic. She's not going to have anyone to go home to, so she's just going to spend even more time with her kids or doing stuff for them. Especially since in this section, we were told that Erin was allowed to teach the same kids for another year, their senior year. I think it's both a good thing and a bad thing at the same time. Her kids will learn a lot in her class, but it's also doesn't seem healthy to me.

I can't believe that Erin organized a trip for almost 200 people to travel across the United States to take a field trip to Washington DC. That's crazy! It must have taken so much time to organize everything, and Erin pretty much did it all herself. I mean they had to reserve a whole airplane just for their group. And their hotel bill must have been ridiculous. Erin's students did a lot of fundraising, but John Tu helped out Erin and her kids the most. He also gave them 36 computers for Erin's classroom, which was generous by itself. Erin's students had a blast in Washington DC, and I'm sure it was just as fun watching them in the nation's capitol. It was a once in a lifetime experience for them, and they all knew it.