When Pam Glynn, a no-nonsense daughter of immigrants, became the principal of Hancock High School, the students were disengaged, not headed toward college, and the staff was dispirited, detached, and even mutinous. Yet before long, Glynn and others managed to turn one of the state's worst-performing high schools into one of Chicago's best. The Make-or-Break Year weaves together stirring accounts of students and educators with cutting-edge research on the pivotal nature of ninth grade, narrating a riveting story of real change happening within a faulty system.