Stand and Deliver is a 1988 American drama film directed by Ramón Menéndez, written by Menéndez and Tom Musca, based on the true story of a high school mathematics teacher, Jaime Escalante. For portraying Escalante, Edward James Olmos was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor at the 61st Academy Awards. The film won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Feature in 1988. The film's title refers to the 1987 Mr. Mister song of the same name, which is also featured in the film's ending credits.
In 2011, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
In the early 1980s, Jaime Escalante becomes a mathematics teacher at James A. Garfield High School in East Los Angeles. The school is full of Latino students from working-class families whose academic achievement is far below their grade level. Two students, Angel and another gangster, arrive late and question Escalante's authority. Escalante demonstrates how to multiply numbers using one's fingers and appeals to the students' sense of humor. After class, some gangsters threaten Escalante. After school, he stops the gangsters from fighting. He then introduces himself as a "one-man gang" with the classroom as his domain. Escalante tells the students that he's decided to teach the students algebra.
At a meeting, Escalante learns that the school's accreditation is under threat, as test scores are not high enough. Escalante says that students will rise to the level that is expected of them. Escalante gives the students a quiz every morning and a new student joins the class. He instructs his class under the philosophy of ganas, roughly translating to "desire".
Escalante tells other faculty that he wants to teach the students calculus. He seeks to change the school culture to help the students excel in academics, as he has seen the untapped potential of his class. Other teachers ridicule him, as the students have not taken the prerequisites.