If you don't know High Tech High in San Diego, you should. It's one of those schools that pulses, from hard-charging principal Larry Rosenstock, through the excellent teaching staff to the many at-risk kids who are succeeding at this charter school. Rosenstock's philosophy is simple: treat kids like adults and they'll act like adults. So at High Tech High, there are no class bells, yet students show up at class early; the school is clean and bright; and there are no security guards at the unlocked doors. High Tech High students are going to college and honoring the school's demanding expectations. No wonder the Gates Foundation is seeking to create fifteen more such schools. But it's not easy. In Forbes, Rosenstock vents about the local school district, which rejected his innovative plan to give teachers who transferred to his school leaves of absence so they wouldn't lose tenure, gives him only 73 percent of the per-pupil allotment, and withheld special education funds three years in a row. Definitely a school worth knowing about.
"Where everyone can overachieve," by Victoria Murphy, Forbes, October 11, 2004