Straight-laced
Princeton University Admissions Officer Portia Nathan has vast experience in the coaching, consoling, and criticism involved in Princeton's admission process. Portia is caught off guard while making a recruiting visit to the Quest School, an
alternative high school overseen by her former college classmate, John Pressman. The free-wheeling John teaches while raising Nelson, his adopted pre-teen son. After exposing Portia to outspoken Quest students' impressions of college, he takes her to meet the rather unconventional Jeremiah, a
child prodigy. Back on campus, Portia's longtime boyfriend Mark breaks up with her after impregnating a "
Virginia Woolf scholar" named Helen. After an awkward romantic attraction to Pressman, she arranges for Jeremiah to visit Princeton, where she and a colleague, Corinne, are rivals to succeed the soon-to-retire Dean of Admissions. Portia long ago had a secret pregnancy, putting the baby up for adoption, and is shown a birth certificate by Pressman proving that Jeremiah is hers. Although he is brilliant, Jeremiah's inferior
transcript results in his being deemed unfit to attend Princeton. In an act that greatly endangers her position, Portia sneaks into the office at night and changes Jeremiah's rejection to an offer for admission, knowing thatif caughtthe Dean of Admissions cannot rescind Jeremiah's already submitted acceptance without creating a scandal. When her actions are exposed, the Dean demands her resignation. Portia confesses to Jeremiah that she is his biological mother, but he proves that she is incorrect; his photocopied birth certificate has a faded imperceptible digit changing his hour of birth, and he has already located his actual biological mother. Portia appears at the adoption agency, trying to locate her son, where she describes her life with a different perspective. When asked how she would feel to meet her actual child, she replies that she would feel "nervous, but lucky". In the end, Portia is now dating Pressman, and she receives a letter about her son, which says he is not ready to meet her yet. Pressman points out to her that she is on the waitlist "... and that's not so bad." ==Cast==