Great River on course

Great River School, located in Energy Park in St. Paul, is the first charter school in Minnesota to offer its students an opportunity to earn a full International Baccalaureate diploma.

For this small Montessori charter school, offering the internationally recognized International Baccalaureate college prep program is a major step toward preparing its students for college success, said Aaron Drevlow, Great River's director. It is also another step back from the financial and management challenges it faced when it opened in 2004.

"It's really about providing the environment for every student's success," Drevlow said.

Joe Nathan, director of the Center for School Change at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, praised Great River's effort to blend Montessori and IB into a new model. Great River is one of only 13 Minnesota high schools offering a full IB diploma to its students, according to the state Department of Education.

"I think it's terrific when you see somebody taking two different ideas that have been established and useful and putting them together to create something new," said Nathan, who helped Great River get its start three years ago.

The school enrolls 210 students in grades 7-12. It will offer a full IB course load to students beginning next fall.

An unsteady beginning

The main problem: Great River was spending more money than its less-than-expected enrollment could provide in state aid. An audit found the school was overspending on its teachers and contracts that were signed without the approval of the school board. The school's previous director resigned and the makeup of the school board changed.

Drevlow, who came to the school from the now-closed Minnesota Business Academy charter school in early 2005, credits better financial management and aggressive fund-raising in helping get the school back on sound footing. The school has been out of statutory operating debt for two years. Its most recent financial report, as of June 1, 2007, showed a $170,000 fund balance.

In the years since its troubled start, Great River has grown into a school that promotes a small community atmosphere and increasingly rigorous academics. Students regularly participate in service projects and class trips to build camaraderie and community, Drevlow said. Students in the 11th and 12th grades make regional college visits each fall. The school is part of a program in which students take placement tests at area community colleges to see how they stack up against incoming freshmen and what they need to improve to get ready for college.

Last fall, a team of 20 students at the school began working to create a wind sensor to help engineers find the best places to put windmills that generate electricity. Thanks to a $10,000 grant from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) -- Great River was one of only 16 schools to win a grant -- students developed a prototype sensor. Another $10,000 grant, this one from Medtronic, helped fund a robotics class at the school.

IB in small school

Drevlow said all the school's juniors and seniors will take IB classes. The school projected an enrollment next fall of 230 students, but officials really don't want Great River to go beyond 250, Drevlow said.

Benedict Moudry, the school's Montessori director, said there are many advantages to being a small school. Great River has few disciplinary problems. Most of the students don't even have locks on their lockers.

"You have to be able to function as a neighbor," Moudry said. "There is no room for grudges. You can't just avoid a person you're not getting along with."

Nora McConnell-Johnson, a 12th-grader, came to Great River four years ago. A student member of the Great River school board, McConnell-Johnson said she has found leadership and learning opportunities here that she couldn't at larger, traditional schools. "It's a lot more open," she said.

Lydia McAnerney, the school's development director and enrollment coordinator, was first involved with the school as a parent. Her son was one of the school's first 18 eighth-graders and she and other parents stuck with the school, through its early struggles and its blossoming.

"It's given him an opportunity to be a leader and learn how to become a leader," she said.

News researcher Roberta Hovde contributed to this report.