Schools That Think

Pretty standard stuff, really -- the basics. What more can you expect from a public-school education?

A lot more, especially if you're a student at Denver's Rocky Mountain School of Expeditionary Learning, a public school, covering grades K through 12, that uses learning expeditions as the foundation of its curriculum. Children from four local school districts are selected by lottery for RMSEL. If they get in, students at every grade level embark on "voyages of learning," near-total immersions in one subject, explored from every possible angle, for months at a time.

Take World War II: For nearly five months, middle-school students explored the war through literature, memoirs, film, museum visits, science projects, a camping trip to a nearby war memorial, creative writing, and talks with senior citizens and concentration-camp survivors.

Besides learning that Robert Oppenheimer was head of the Manhattan Project, they've also conducted experiments to test the theories of matter and energy that the bomb is based on. They've studied the effects of radiation and written pamphlets about its dangers. And, as with all learning expeditions at RMSEL, the class topped off its months of studying World War II with an in-depth project: After a visit to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, in Washington, DC, the students returned to school and went about creating their own museum.

Now, that's learning, and the kids know it. "I can't recall what I learned in public school two years ago," says Misha Kravitz, 12, who transferred to RMSEL in the fall of 1999 from a traditional school. "It just wasn't interesting. This school makes it interesting."

RMSEL humanities teacher Kathleen McHugh, 30, one of four middle-school teachers who developed and taught the World War II expedition, describes the classroom experience as "in-depth learning." "It's not learning from the outside, or skimming the surface," she says. "You live it, you breathe it, and you do it to learn it."

McHugh sums up the passion that drives this school -- that learning is a living, breathing, hands-on, hearts-and-minds-engaged experience with high goals and lofty expectations. "Why is it when you go on a three-week Outward Bound course, you're transformed for life," asks executive director Rob Stein, 40, "but you can't remember what you learned in seventh grade? Outward Bound has this quality of high stakes, high standards, and the support so that everyone succeeds. That's our goal: to make school more like Outward Bound."

RMSEL began as a pilot project in 1993, one of 10 sites selected by Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound as a demonstration school for expeditionary learning. The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based organization is one of eight projects sponsored by the New American Schools Development Corp., which is a nonprofit group of educators and business and community leaders that supports the development of break-the-mold designs for public schools.

In the years since its creation, RMSEL, with its 315-member student body, has served as a model for other public schools interested in expeditionary learning. To date, 85 schools in 25 states, working with ELOB, have made the switch.

And the results? Students routinely outscore other area students on national standardized tests. One longitudinal study by the Denver public schools showed that 72% of youngsters who transferred to RMSEL improved their reading scores.

The performance measures use old standards, traditional criteria. Real achievement at RMSEL is measured by something completely different: the students' portfolios, a rigorous body of work that reflects their learning and knowledge. RMSEL students do not receive letter grades or pass routinely from one grade to the next. They must prepare portfolios and present them to a panel of judges that include teachers and members of the community. These comprehensive reviews are required on four different occasions during the course of a student's career: to pass from second to third grade, from fifth to sixth grade, and from eighth to ninth grade, and to graduate.

The learning expeditions -- among them the "American dream," "Harlem renaissance," "Galileo and the scientific revolution," and the "eye, art, and the camera" -- are the raw material for the portfolios. Each portfolio has a different set of requirements that meet or exceed state education standards. A fifth-grade portfolio, for example, must have, among other things, a personal statement that reflects a student's thoughts on the learning experience; a research project using a variety of resources that shows an understanding of a culture or historical period; and an analysis of a scientific article that demonstrates a clear understanding of the subject. Instead of grades, students are assessed using four levels of achievement, from beginning to exemplary. Those who fail to complete their portfolios do not move on to the next grade until the portfolio is finished.