: After graduation, former classmates decide to have fun in an unusual way, which leads them to a quarrel. At this time, their teachers are arguing about how to properly educate students.

Graduation party at school. After the holiday, six classmates gather at the river to be together goodbye. A boy from a wealthy family, an athlete Gena Golikov, an excellent student Julia Studentseva, a beauty Natka Bystrova, “her boyfriend” Vera Jerich, guitarist and merry maker Socrates Onuchin and artist Igor Proukhov have known each other for a long time. An idea arises: everyone will express his opinion about the others, not hiding even bad thoughts. The first to find out the truth about himself is called Gena Golikov. He is sure that school friends will not say bad things about him.

But suddenly Gena receives from Vera, Yulia and Igor reproaches of callousness, selfless selfishness and meanness. Natka says that Gena is a coward and is not able to express her feelings.

You are a firefly, Gene, you burn beautifully, but you don’t warm you.

Only Socrates refrains from reviews of Gene.

Hearing offends Gena. He begins to answer classmates with barbs. He calls faith an empty, inexpressive and envious person who hides her insignificance behind kindness. Julia, according to him, is selfish and is ready to trample anyone in the mud.Igor suffers from a feeling of excessive self-conceit and will die from his own malice. He humiliates even Socrates, comparing him to "a harmless lamb." He delivers the hardest blow to Natka, whom he was in love with during his school years. Once he was walking along the river, and Natka, bathing there, got out of the water and intentionally appeared to him without clothes. After talking about this, he calls her "a female who is waiting to be thrown at her." Natka begins to beat him, and Gena runs away.

Suddenly, Socrates reports that the enemy of Gena, the bully Yashka Ax, decided to watch over Gena for a walk and kill him. He learned this from one of Yasha’s friends. At first, classmates try to convince themselves that Gena is no longer their friend, and their fate does not bother them, but Julia argues that it would be wrong not to warn him of such a danger, no matter what kind of person he is. Gradually, friends begin to regret that it all happened, they recognize that Gena is not such a bad guy. Natka is going to search for Gena.

At the same time, six teachers were arguing in the teacher's office about how to “prepare the best people from students”. Teachers were saddened by the fact that Julia Studentseva during graduation stated that the school forced her to learn everything except what she liked. The old teacher Zoya Vladimirovna considers such words to be ungrateful and regrets that Studentseva can no longer be punished. The head teacher Olga Olegovna says that Zoya Vladimirovna herself teaches the subject (literature) so unappealingly that she turns students away from him.

All literature is a set of dry formulas that can neither be loved nor hated. No exciting literature!

Zoya Vladimirovna takes offense and leaves.

Physics teacher Reshnikov says that Olga Olegovna also sometimes does the wrong thing. He teaches physics in his own way: he distinguishes students who are more capable of physics, supplies them with interesting information, hoping to rekindle their interest in the subject. Olga Olegovna, on the other hand, prevents him from this, as she believes that the teacher should not have any favorites. Reshnikov asks her "not to disturb him from cultivating his garden." Mathematician Innokenty Sergeyevich offers his own option for improving pedagogy: to film the lectures of the best teachers and teach children using these films, which will free up some of the time from teachers and allow you to be creative in preparing students.

Knowledge has long been acquired through machines, but for some reason it is transmitted, so to speak, manually.

Director Ivan Ignatievich says that this idea is still far from being implemented, but we still need to think about improving the quality of education. Teachers suddenly see that the youngest of them, Nina Semenovna, cries, thinking that she is not such a good teacher (Studentseva studied in her class). Olga Olegovna says that the main thing is to teach the younger generation not to offend people. To this, Nina Semenovna replies that the students of her class (Igor, Gene, Julia and others) are kind and sympathetic.

If they begin to offend each other, then ... there is only one thing left - to hang yourself on the first nail from despair.

Reshnikov and Innokenty go home and decide to have a drink - 31 years ago, in 1941 the war began. Innocent says of his students: "Let's drink so that they do not freeze in the trenches."

And classmates (except Gena and Natka) again go to school. Igor says: "We will still learn to live."