Romance blooms at Phillips Junior High when teacher Art Malamud, the school's union rep, meets Mandy Sayer, the newest member of the faculty. As the school year progresses, Art leads his colleagues in the historic Los Angeles teachers' strike of 1970 and stokes the ire of the principal, Vivian Laws. Though Art has tenure and relative immunity from Laws's personal attacks, Mandy does not. As a result, she receives an unfair evaluation of her first year's work and even harsher criticism at the start of her second. Mandy's local grievance leads to a major battle with the school district, and the injustice ends up threatening not only her professional life but her future with Art as well.