Stand and deliver

This film, based on fact, is the story of Jaime Escalante, an electronics engineer who abandoned a lucrative career to teach a group of inner city Chicano students the value of education. Arriving at Garfield High in east Los Angeles, Escalante found the school caught in the vicious circle of poor academic records and degenerating school standards. Battling almost insurmountable odds, he taught the unruly youngsters to excel in calculus. When the entire class passed a difficult exam, education authorities suspected cheating, forcing Escalante and his pupils to again prove their academic merit. (Circulates)

Jaime Escalante is a math teacher at James A. Garfield High School in East Los Angeles. The school is full of Hispanic students from working-class families who are far below their grade level in terms of academic skills and also have a lot of social problems. He teaches his students to overcome adversity and to pass the AP Calculus exams. The Educational Testing Service questions the success of the students, suggesting they cheated.