When the $62 million facility opened in 2006 with a relatively small student population, a computer-based curriculum delivered with the latest technology tools, and a unique partnership with corporate giant Microsoft, it set out to upend a secondary school model that had changed little since the industrial era and had spelled failure for too many students here and in cities around the country.

Now in its fourth year, and with its first class of seniors heading toward graduation, Philadelphia’s School of the Future remains just that: an ideal whose realization remains somewhere down the road.

Located in a modern white building, the school stands out from the neighboring rows of run-down houses. And it serves as a beacon for students seeking to avoid the city’s comprehensive high schools, many of which are crowded and aging.

But the school’s messy path to reform has included leadership instability, wavering commitment from the central office to its mission, swings in curricular approaches, technological glitches, and challenges in meeting the academic needs of a disadvantaged student population. Those problems have left many analysts wondering whether the much-ballyhooed school can live up to the hype.

When it opened, the school’s promise was seen in its potential for tapping technology to create an innovative learning environment that is “continuous, adaptive, and relevant,” as the school motto states. By stirring in Microsoft business principles, as well as learning resources and support services, the school seemed to many observers to have found a winning formula. ("Where Big-City Schools Meet ‘Microsoft Smarts’," Sept. 20, 2006.)

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