Stand and Deliver Part Two

Stand and Deliver has a movie about one teacher’s tenacity to equality. Just because his students were minorities on the down and out so early in life, did not mean that they were not as smart as a white student in private school. He believed in them and their ability to learn even when they did not. He knew that if he slowly increased the bar that they would and could rise to the challenge. His cause did not stop at the children; he even cut into his personal life by volunteering at night school for people learning English as a second language. A truly astonishing true story, though it did not come without consequence, due to stress Escalante’s health declined and he was soon hospitalized. Not that a mere heart attack could stop him. By this point, he was tightly bound to his students and they had grown attached to him as well. They knew that without him there was no hope of them achieving their goal, which was to pass the AP Calculus test. Unsurprisingly, Escalante returns from the hospital early instead of resting. Hard to say if this was an act of selflessness or if he had another agenda. Regardless, in the end they all passed the AP exam, however, not without some resistance. The school board, or whatever, believed they had cheated due to similar wrong answers on each test. Which, looking back on it, could have been a completely false accusation and the true reason was due to the fact of their ethnicity. Given the time period, I feel that is the most likely and so did Escalante. He always had looked out for them and he wasn’t about to stop then. He renews their belief in themselves and convinces them to retake the test. This time they have to be sure not to give them a reason to believe they cheated. Escalante was truly a unifier. He could pull them together even when they were at the last thread and ready to snap.

It was without a doubt an inspirational film and if only all the students out there could have a teacher so devoted to their class. Sadly, that is not a reality we can ever live in. We can only hope that students will continuously rise to the level of expectation, just as the students of Mr. E did.