The movie "Dangerous Minds" discusses the lives of students of whom the education system has given up hope for. In this movie the instructor Mrs.LouAnne Johnson (Michelle Pfeiffer), undergoes many struggles with trying to reach out to the students who have gotten shunned to being considered "rejects from Hell" by other teachers. As Mrs. Johnson connects with he class she begins to realize the struggles that inhabit their lives and begins to connect with them individually and attempts to confront other officials in the school for their help with trying to make her students see they are still acknowledged as students as well. Throughout the movie we see her trying to adjust their outside struggles with negative influences such as drugs, gangs and just having got intertwined with the wrong people, in an effort to have their focus in the classroom.

Mrs.Johnson had tried to show the potential they have, she tries to connect with them in various ways from dressing more like them, after being judged after the first day of her teaching. She also tries to show she relates to them by teaching them karate. So as Johnson sees that these students have their own struggles and a lot of obstacles to overcome as a whole she tries to influence them in a positive way. She wants them to individually invite her into their lives, because she saw the neglect and repercussions of what the school had done to them by classifying them as rejects, rather than students struggling with their surrounding influences. Johnson wanted to differ than every other instructor and actually impact these students.

Johnson uses different methods to awaken interest and hope within this class of students. She devises classroom exercises that teach similar principles to the prescribed work, but using themes and language that appeal to the streetwise students. She also tries to motivate them by giving them all an A grade from the beginning of the year, and arguing that the only thing required of them is that they maintain it. By applying this method towards being successful in class it allowed her students to see she wasn't just any other teacher -she wanted them to succeed. Johnson invites this rebellious group of students to poetry by introducing them to BobDylan's "Mr.Tambourine". She sees how they begin t participate in conversation instead of shunning the material being asked of them to analyze. Johnson tries to implicate different methods of incentives in an effort to attain their trust. She awards responses in class with candy bars, reward incentives, and eventually a theme park tip which she individually funds. These methods attract other school officials to want to alter Johnson's way of instruction and assure her that she must align her teachings by the curriculum provided.

Johnson begins connecting to these students on different levels and sees their progress as she continues to open up with them. She advises her students to come to her for any help. She connects with a girl named Callie Roberts who seemed to shine in English but gets pregnant, and questions education. She also makes a deal with a student to get his grades to improve she decides to take him out on a fancy dinner. Johnson seems to continue to show her students that they can succeed and that they can attribute knowledge and cause an influence on their society, to pull away from this dangerous life of street crimes, and gang violence.

This movie shows the different ways that an education system in particular can shun a particularly struggling group of students that allowed their surrounding environment to influence their education.