This is the second in a three-part series about how Providence’s Hope High School redeemed itself from being an educational blight.

“You can have the best teachers in the world; you can have the curriculum aligned with the tests, you can have it all, but if you can’t take control of the corridors, nothing at your school is ever going to get better.” Arthur Petrosinelli, one of Hope High’s principals, didn’t mean to be shouting, but he was.

Providence’s Hope High School made huge gains in the recently-released statewide test results. They nearly tripled their scores in reading — the biggest gains in the state — and got good boosts in math and writing, too.

But in fall 2005, when Petrosinelli and two other administrators first came to Hope, the school’s pathetic test scores were the least of their problems. The place was insane. Kids routinely streamed out of class to watch a fight in the hallways. Gang members hovered outside the building waiting for action. Hope was one of the three unnamed urban schools in the 2003 book Fire in the Bathroom, featuring interviews with angry, neglected students in chaotic urban high schools. In fact, Hope did have fires in the bathroom just about every day.

In 2005, the state intervened in this mess with the “Hope Order,” a hefty list of requirements which, among other things, mandated that the school implement “advisories.” An advisory system has each teacher take responsibility for roughly 15 students, to know them personally and shepherd them through their school experience. With willing teachers, these small groups become a school family.

For over four decades, educators and researchers have known that students are more disciplined and successful when each has an adult advocate in the building. God only knows why schools have resisted the practice so staunchly, but they have. Hope’s advisories were not a suggestion. The school’s staff had to sign letters agreeing to implement everything in the Hope Order. Half of the faculty refused and left.

So in 2005, Hope’s practices, administrators and faculty were new, but the students were not. Returning students expected their old anarchic school. The adults had no choice but to devote the first months of the new regime just to civilizing the kids. Administrators worked their tails off curbing unwanted behavior. The teachers worked with one another and their advisees to develop an advisory curriculum that would get kids engaged with their academics, and with their future.

Guidance counselor Diane West, a Hope teacher before and after the Order, believes that Hope’s advisories have gotten dramatically better each year. Advisories meet for 90 minutes on Wednesdays when they discuss a big topic, like dating violence and relationships. These discussions help teachers know what’s going on with their kids. Advisories are all about supporting academics, but to a large extent the method is to cultivate mini-communities that take care of one another.

Eniola, one of about a dozen kids I spoke with, said gratefully, “My adviser is like having another parent.” She’d been in two Providence high schools before coming to Hope as a junior. (About 40 percent of Hope’s students are mobile, which is to say they leave and are replaced in a year, a fact that naturally depresses their test scores and graduation rate.) The Hope advisory took Eniola under its wing, so for once she felt welcomed and helped as a new student.

Hope advisories have kids work on two plans, one of which is the Academic Learning Plan (ALP). In essence, it’s an ongoing academic audit, using a form with the requirements laid on a grid at the left — the graduation portfolio requirements, electives, courses for their academy focus. Each quarter, students record courses they’ve taken, their grades and graduation status. They can see for themselves what’s incomplete or what help they might need.

Students’ heads nodded when Dionis said, “What I like is that it’s focused. It helps me stay on task, work on my portfolio, be organized and prepared for the next step.”

Laurelis lived in Puerto Rico before entering Hope as a sophomore. Her ALP quickly surfaced the missing credits for any 9th grade courses. “I was so stressed because I didn’t have those papers. What if I stayed back?” Her adviser worked with her mom, who eventually managed to get the transcript from the old school.

The other plan is an Individual Physical Academic Social Success Plan (I-PASS) designed to teach kids to plan for success. They set personal goals regarding their physical, social and personal health, as well as career ambitions. They record what they consider to be the obstacles to those goals. At the end of each quarter, kids write short essays about what they’ve learned. In a selection of I-PASSes, I saw that one girl wanted to lose 10 pounds, and by the end of the quarter, she’d lost only 6, which mildly annoyed her. One boy wanted to quit fighting. By the end of the quarter, he was proud he’d been able to walk away from most trouble. Mediated by the teachers, kids discuss their plans in advisory meetings, and get on one another to “get real” when the goals and behavior don’t line up. Yes, peer-group accountability is a beautiful thing.

Kevin said sheepishly, “I used to be late every day. But then every day my adviser called my mother. It was bad. Now she drops me off so I’m not late. I didn’t appreciate it at the time.” The kids laughed. Nodding, he admitted, “I do now.”

At least once a month, advisers call each of their kids’ homes to pass on news about coming tests or events. They make a point of saying good things. They might suggest how to help a struggling student at home. Advisers keep a log of these calls, because this monthly task is required. Parents show up in droves at school events.

These days happy-looking kids dressed in hip-hop, urban styles with armloads of books chat peacefully as they walk Hope’s hallways.

By invitation, Hope has been peacock proud to present its advisory strategy at conferences such as the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) (repeatedly), Breaking Ranks (also more than once), the American School Counselor Association, the New England Association of Schools and Colleges, and many more. To my mind, the ALP and I-PASS are especially useful.

Even so, while great advisories are a necessary condition for improving test scores, especially in urban schools, they are not sufficient. Teaching and curriculum must deliver the bacon. Hope’s academic strategy is also creative, as we’ll see next week.

Julia Steiny, a former member of the Providence School Board, consults for government agencies and schools; she is co-director of Information Works!, Rhode Island’s school-accountability project. She can be reached at juliasteiny@cox.net, or c/o EdWatch, The Providence Journal, 75 Fountain St., Providence, RI 02902.