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"At first I was surprised, shocked really, at how the students and teachers were held accountable," said Tina Davis, who has three children at the school. "But now we just assume the kids are going to accomplish more and go higher than they would have because of this school."

A national program

Gaston College Prep and Pride High are products of something called KIPP, shorthand for the Knowledge is Power Program. KIPP, which runs more than 40 schools nationwide, started in 1995 with two schools in inner-city Houston and New York's South Bronx. The schools are free and have no entrance requirements.

KIPP gained national attention in 1999 when it was profiled on the CBS program "60 Minutes." In 2000, the two urban schools were showcased at the Republican National Convention. The next stop was rural America.

KIPP's founders settled on Gaston, a town of fewer than 1,000 people. But it wasn't just the town that attracted them. It was Tammi Sutton and Caleb Dolan.

Sutton and Dolan were already working in Gaston as part of Teach for America, a program that recruits high-achieving college graduates from disciplines outside of teaching.

Teach for America expects its recruits to spend at least two years in inner-city or rural classrooms, but Dolan and Sutton were overachievers -- they seemed never to leave their classrooms.

It was exactly the kind of commitment KIPP's founders were looking for. Gaston College Prep was formed with one group of fifth-graders. Since then, a new grade has been added each year.

Classroom success came quickly, and it wasn't long before teachers realized the kids would probably backslide if they returned to local high schools. So Sutton and Dolan started talking about scholarships to send them off to boarding schools. That idea eventually gave way to something more practical.

They decided to build their own high school. Until it's ready, ninth-graders are housed in a separate set of classroom trailers.

This all makes perfect sense to Sutton and Dolan, who weren't trained in a traditional college of education and don't spend much time worrying about the the way schools are supposed to operate.

"You just use your common sense and stay away from things that don't directly benefit the kids," Sutton said.

And it helps immensely that Gaston College Prep and Pride High are both charter schools. That frees them from many of the policies and rules that govern traditional schools -- and it dovetails with the autonomy required by KIPP. Those differences paved the way for longer days, longer years, a principal with full authority and teachers who might -- or might not -- be certified.

It does not mean they run a fancy school. The 27-acre campus is mostly a collection of classroom trailers. About three-fourths of its $2.3 million budget comes from state and county tax dollars as dictated by charter school laws. Fund-raisers and grants cover much of the remaining costs.

But the school leaders are convinced that the quality of teachers -- not buildings -- dictates success. That's partly why teachers are paid up to 30 percent more than they could make in surrounding schools. The rules are simple. If something works, keep it. If it doesn't, toss it out.

For Danielle Brown, that means an unceasing, high-energy, in-your-face approach that defies students to ignore her. When a boy gets caught up in a vocabulary lesson about the word "ravenous," he tells Brown he is ravenously hungry every 30 minutes. She acts incredulous. After all, she tells him, a class period is 90 minutes.

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