Discipline along with love

CLEVELAND: Ginn Academy resembles no urban public school I’ve ever visited: all male, dress shirt and tie, the Socratic method employed in classrooms. School spirit seems imported from the prep school; discipline from the playing field; aspiration from the church pew. Students file in to their weekly assembly to the hymn “You’re Just Right for a Miracle.” One gives a public reading of an essay about his mother: “She sees my potential. She sees what others can’t.” Inspirational speakers often stop by; a West Point graduate from the neighborhood recently left a strong impression.

Students are urged to be “Ginn men.” It is an ideal with the strong imprint of a particular man, Ted Ginn, the high school football coach who was seized with the initial vision for the academy. While possessing few academic qualifications, Coach Ginn has a credential often lacking in prison-like, urban public schools: a passionate belief in the potential of at-risk children. “You can’t have people around young people who don’t love kids,” he says. “If you don’t have love, you don’t have nothing.” Love creates a child’s internal desire to meet external expectations.