Education: The Bus Doesn't Stop Here

The 6600 block of South Ellis Avenue anchors one of Chicago's scarier neighborhoods. Students who attend the Alexandre Dumas Elementary School located there have had their $100 Nike sneakers stolen off their feet on the way to class in the morning. Drugs are everywhere. "It's a constant battle for the children to get here," says principal Sylvia Peters, who oversees the institution's 682 pupils and 40 teachers.

Dumas is a 100% black inner-city public school, the kind of place that has an appalling reputation. By all rights, things should be just as bleak inside the scarred cinder-block building as outside. But...