The Education of Jane Cumming

Edinburgh, 1810. Teachers Jane Pirie and Marianne Woods embark on their dream of an independent life together and open a boarding school. Their lives are changed forever when a wealthy aristocrat enrols Jane Cumming, her “illegitimate” 15-year-old grandchild from India. The teachers struggle to integrate the girl who remains an outsider among her classmates. Miss Pirie and Miss Woods are brought closer to Jane when her grandmother insists they look after her over the summer. Private and professional lines blur, affection between them grows and they start to form an unlikely family. Tensions rise, however, as the new term begins. The two teachers are overwhelmed by the girl’s increasing desire for closeness as well as by their own changing relationship. As Jane begins to feel excluded from her new family, she demands to be taken home to her grandmother. An accusation follows which leaves the teachers in an existential battle, resulting in a legal fight that would last a decade and scandalise the Scottish establishment. Based on true events.

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