Synopsis/Details
As a prominent member of the school’s film club, senior student Jimmy Liang has high hopes of entering into one of the top film schools and has applied to NYU for Early Decision. One day his friend MICHAEL, who wants to go to MIT but is negatively affected by his mediocre english grades, offers the questions and answers of a math unit test to Jimmy, as Michael’s math class a day earlier than Jimmy’s. In exchange, he wants Jimmy, who is better at english, to write his papers. While at first declining the offer Jimmy eventually takes the deal as he struggles to answer the final question on his test.
Act 2
Unfortunately Jimmy was rejected from NYU. Devastated by the results and refusing to go to the lesser known film school LSU out of pride, he decides to apply for Harvard. He offers his SAT tudor, EDDIE, 1500/test to take the test for him, Michael, and MAX, another friend struggling with academics. To raise the money, the three create a cheating ring that sells test questions to other students. The group members are also not allowed to apply to the same schools to avoid competition between each other.
As an unusually high number of students are getting exceptional scores, the math teacher, MR. SIMON suspects cheating and makes the tests different between the two classes so answers cannot be exchanged. The cheaters respond by enlisting the help of DANNY, a top student in Jimmy’s math class. Their new method of cheating is that they hide a phone under the disguise of a calculator, and Danny will be texting answers during the test via an anonymous messaging app. In exchange, Jimmy offers to make Danny the school treasurer by fixing the Student Council election.
Mr. Simon and the Principle launches an investigation on the inflated test scores. A few students come forward, claiming that Danny is responsible for sending the answers. As there are no evidence linking any of the cheating back to Jimmy, Danny is forced to strike a deal with Mr. Simon. He wiretaps one of Jimmy’s meetings with the other members.
When the school decisions finally release, Jimmy receives a conditional offer from Princeton, and gets wait-listed for Harvard. The other members of the cheating ring also got admitted into their dream school. At a celebration party Jimmy overhears that Max got accepted into Harvard.
Meanwhile, there is one more test left for the year, which is the IB final exam. If they fail this test the offers they received can still be withdrawn. They are ready to cheat one last time. Jimmy acquires a set of earpiece and a button camera and use it to communicate with the tudors who previously sat in for them in their SATs. When Jimmy finishes his last exam he walks out of the gym and is taken to the principle’s office. There, the Principle tells him that his diploma is denied and shows him Danny’s tape recording. Jimmy’s parents are very angry to hear the news. The next day Jimmy beats up Danny.
Act 3
The Principle is surprised by the sudden visit of two superintendents. It is revealed that Jimmy contacted the IBO superintendent informing them of a cheating incident at his high school while he sets up Max to be caught on his last exam. This set up forces the Principle to choose between implicating Jimmy and the 40 other students who are involved with him, which will heavily damage the school reputation, or he lets the superintendents catch Max cheating in the finals which makes it look like the school prevented a cheating incident. The Principle chooses the later.
Jimmy receives an interview opportunity from Harvard. He attends the interview and meets his interviewer, Harvard alumni MR. BROOKS. He blazes through the questions, answering each without missing a beat, but when he is asked “why do you want to go to Harvard?” Jimmy finds himself tongue tied. On graduation day we learn that Jimmy got rejected from Harvard.
