From the time she was a little girl, author Marion R. Shapiro had wanted to become a teacher. But that didn't become a reality until after she spent twenty-nine years in the business world. In 1994, Shapiro was afforded the opportunity to earn her credentials while teaching full time in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Her second career at age forty-six, Shapiro was no spring chicken when she entered the teaching profession. In Teaching in the Hood, she shares many of her experiences during her twenty-year journey teaching in the heart of poverty and gang life. Shapiro communicates the joy, frustration, anger, and sorrow she and other teachers felt and feel in and out of the classroom. She tells of a few of the many children she was privileged to teach and the lessons she learned from them--the triumphs and heartbreaks, the ups and downs, the successes and failures Shapiro experienced daily. Offering insight into the classroom, Teaching in the Hood gives supportive understanding to new and seasoned teachers and encourages those considering entering the teaching profession.