Documentary Features Comanche Academy Charter School

The Comanche Academy Charter School in Lawton, Oklahoma, will be featured in “A Healing Journey," a documentary that will be released eight months after filming is completed in May.

Director Kathryn Boyd-Batstone said the documentary is about the healing journey the students are on.

“And how the impact of them learning Comanche language and finding that community with each other is like other Native children,” she said. “Just the ripple effect of impact that's happening generationally.”

Boyd-Batstone said she got the title after talking to Linette Amparan, one of the charter school teachers.

“I was on this other documentary that was like taking us through the U.S. and going to different schools that were kind of trying to rethink the idea of student success, and someone referred us to Comanche Academy,” she said. “And just like immediately meeting her, I was like, ‘There's something so special happening here,’ and she just brought up that term, ‘Like a healing journey,’ and it just really stuck with me, and then I've learned more about like what's happening.”

Boyd-Batstone said on that past documentary she went to different schools and enjoyed the charter school for teaching emotional regulation.

“Hearing about the social-emotional learning that was happening here, it just really stuck with me,” she said. “Because I'm all about feelings and, like, seeing that being learned in school and just like even after a first visit, just like witnessing the kids just go through like, ‘Okay, let me talk through my emotions, figure out what I'm feeling and being told like every day I am beautiful, I am resilient, I am powerful.’ It's just, like, ‘Why would you not cover this?’”

Boyd-Batstone said she wanted to give the school recognition for their passion for educating the students.

“Speaking with Ms. Linette and Dava, I could just see the amount of passion that they had for these kids and, like, their success and creating a change,” she said.

Boyd-Batstone said there’s a lot of pre-planning to put on this kind of documentary.

“Ms. Linette has been absolutely amazing of coordinating so much with the school, and I'm grateful for, like, the trust that we've built with each other and with everyone at this school,” she said. “Because I think that's the core of what goes into it: is that, like, trust in each other.”

Boyd-Batstone said she was grateful to be in the spaces.

“I grew up in a dual immersion program myself, so like kindergarten to fifth grade, everything was in Spanish for me, so being in this bilingual setting is familiar, and that for me personally like served me so well and just opened so many doors and just broadened my mind so much,” she said. “So being here and seeing the kids get that experience too, I'm like, ‘Oh, just wait, just wait.’”

Boyd-Batstone said her crew will be back in May for the kindergarten grade graduation ceremony and hopes everyone can see how special the Comanche Academy is.

Comanche tribal member Jhane Myers, who also produced Prey, will be producing the documentary.