The winner of numerous awards on the festival circuit — Special Jury Prize at the Los Angeles Film Festival; Best Documentary at the Philadelphia Cinequest; Audience Awards at the Aspen Film Festival and Portland International Film Festival — PRESSURE COOKER highlights two semesters in the culinary arts class of Wilma Stephenson, an irreverent high school teacher in Northeast Philadelphia. 

Stephenson’s no-holds-barred teaching style helps her students earn college scholarships which, in turn, enable them to escape their economically marginal and often socially challenged lives.  The prospect of attaining a promising future can hinge on their ability to master the art of making perfect crepes or tournée potatoes. 

Behind her tough-talking exterior is a teacher who cares passionately about getting the best from her students.  Famously blunt, Stephenson spells it all out on the first day of school when she tells newcomers to her class that 11 members of the previous year’s group earned over $750,000 in scholarships, a staggering amount at a school where over 40% of the students don’t make it to senior year. 

She offers the kids her version of the American Dream:  "You choose a realistic goal.  You work hard.  You work the system.  You get out of Northeast Philadelphia."

Some of them do.  Some of them don’t.