Minimum Competency

In Snyder's Corners a small dot on the western rim of New York's Catskill Mountains life is tough. Jobs are scarce money is tight and the best part of education is the state-ranked basketball team.<p> Jimmy Kalid a ninth-grade English teacher at Kaaterskill Central School in the area's centralized district realizes something's amiss. Despite impressive test scores his students can barely read. Then his new girlfriend Phyllis Nielsen while substituting for the eighth-grade English teacher makes a discovery that causes everything to make sense.<p> When Joseph Scalani the nephew of a mob boss-and paper pusher in the State Department of Education-comes to town with evidence of test tampering he's hoping to shake down the perpetrators. Instead he meets a pair of incompetents: the bumbling Chief School Officer and his lackey. These two must scramble to cover their tracks confounding a county sheriff who rarely sees anything beyond petty theft.<p> As the mob the school's leadership and the sheriff collide each player rises to his true level of incompetence. Their only hope to unravel the mystery is the town's singular pair of intelligent teachers - Jimmy Kalid and Phyllis Nielsen.