The dramatic, behind-the-scenes story of the goings-on at Hanson High School--gritty yet tender and full of surprises: An idealistic Robert Mariner is offered the helm of a failing school. His mission: to reform it, and the quicker the better. Eager for the challenge, he accepts against his wife Olivia's wishes. Things soon go wrong. Rumors of race and drugs erupt with the discovery of a student's dead body. The community and school board are up in arms. Mariner is shot at and his family threatened. Olivia pleads with him to quit before it's too late. As Mariner labors to put down a new outbreak of trouble at the school, at home he struggles to save his marriage and protect his family. But can he do both and still rehabilitate his school? And at what cost to his principles?