Love letter to a restive city, The Mission Higher juxtaposes the generation galvanized by the strikes of the 1930s with the next generation of its own children in neighborhoods fragmented by racial dynamics in the late 1950s. A fictional telling of real events, it brings long-deserved recognition to Mission High School coach Ernie McNealy whose courage and conviction single-handedly stopped a racial gang war and helped yet another generation of San Franciscans learn to value the ethnic diversity of the city.