Schools that work.

Byline: Megan Boldt, Maryjo Sylwester, Meggen Lindsay and Doug Belden

Jun. 4--On paper, the schools appear troubled: low-income students, low state test scores. But a closer look reveals 13 are doing better than expected. Annabelle Siedschlag trusted that her children's school, Dayton's Bluff Elementary in St. Paul, could rid itself of the problems plaguing it in the late 1990s: Poor discipline. Low test scores. Bad morale. The challenges are not uncommon at schools such as Dayton's Bluff that serve mostly low-income students. But Siedschlag had faith in the teachers she said nurtured students, and she thought things would get better. They did. A new principal arrived in 2001 and renewed the school's energy. Expectations became clear. Students respected teachers. And staffers now go out of their way to support parents. "My sons are always aching to go to school," said Siedschlag, whose five children have attended or are now at Dayton's Bluff. "(Teachers) don't lie about caring. You know they care. "The school has grown a lot," she said. "It's come a long way." Evidence of that turnaround can seem elusive. In fact, the East Side school typically appears only mediocre when the state Education Department releases test scores for all Minnesota schools. But those numbers don't tell the whole story. Schools with large numbers of students from low-income families -- or who move often, are learning English or have other special needs -- almost always fare worse on standardized tests, most educators agree.

The Pioneer Press analyzed three years of test scores from all 731 Minnesota elementary schools to predict how well each school should do when its percentage of low-income students is taken into account -- effectively leveling the playing field between the haves and have-nots.

The result: Dayton's Bluff emerges as one of 13 schools that are beating the odds, are doing better than predicted and seem to have found a way to overcome…