NYC’s School of One Customizes Math Learning

The New York City schools' program is restructuring school time and deploying digital-learning tools to customize education and raise math achievement

By Ian Quillen

To explain the School of One , Joel Rose has a short list of long metaphors.

Imagine a hectic airport, he says, where students are the planes, the lessons are the gates, and the passengers are the skills each child needs to master. Or envision a hospital where teachers are surgeons summoned only in crucial cases, and the students are patients whose injuries are the most difficult questions.

Even the student workspaces for the program are an exercise in symbolic reality. For example, at the 800-student Middle School 131 in Manhattan’s Chinatown, students shuffle between “Brooklyn Bridge,” “Pier 17,” and “City Hall,” each designated for a...