The senior year of high school is a milestone in the lives of many teenagers, often marked by high stress around grades, test scores, college applications, and what the future may bring. The final film in director Peter Nicks’s trilogy about Oakland (The Waiting Room and The Force), Homeroom follows students from Oakland High School’s Class of 2020 as they face these challenges and navigate completing the year in the midst of a global pandemic and national outcry for systemic change. Nicks focuses in on their personal experiences, capturing the pressures and achievements of this time of transition in stunning cinéma vérité, and weaves in the students’ own social media videos to highlight the way they see the world around them. Staring down budget cuts for the school district, the students come together to demand the removal of police officers from the schools. As the film lays bare the enormous weight on young people to achieve scholastically and socially, it also highlights those who see possibility beyond systems as they exist and who are not afraid to stand up and make a difference.  ST

Filmmaker Q&A available

Closed Captioning available

This film is only available to viewers in the United States