The movie was based on a true story. Morgan Freeman plays Joe Clark, as a grade school principal, to be a principal at Eastside High school. In many past years the school was a promising school, and had now been affected by the changing of that part of New Jersey.

The children and faculty lived in fear. Clark rounded up all the troublemakers and sent them away. That brought out the decency in all the children already there. To keep the school safe Clark patrolled the halls with a baseball bat and locked the doors with chains. He controlled the whole school, he was known for firing teachers for talking back, he grew school spirit by forcing children to randomly sing the school song.

Clark ran into trouble when a member on the school committee wanted him off. The women got the fire Marshall to check the school...