Founder saw educational needs in business

Scott Gordon, founder of Mastery Charter Schools, did not start out as an educator.

Gordon, 45, a Phi Beta Kappa economics major at the State University of New York at Binghamton who earned a master's in business administration from Yale University's School of Management, got involved with schools in response to the need he saw in business for educated workers who could work cooperatively.

An executive who used to oversee development of cereals for General Foods Corp. in White Plains, N.Y., and once supervised the marketing strategies for Grape-Nuts, Gordon founded a worker-owned home health company in Philadelphia. The company's mission was training and employing public-assistance recipients. And Gordon's experiences there showed the need for improving public schools.

But it was his work in 2000 as a consultant to Greater Philadelphia First on a project on the need for more skilled workers in the region that led him to found Mastery Charter High School in Center City with the help of several business leaders.

Their goal was creating "a new kind of high school" that would provide students with the academic and personal skills they would need to succeed in college, the workplace and life.

Originally known as High Tech High, the charter opened in the fall of 2001. Students had to show "mastery" by achieving 76 percent in subjects before they could advance to the next level. The school stresses the development of personal skills, critical thinking, and cooperative work habits.

The charter earned accolades, including being named an exemplary charter school by the U.S. Department of Education in 2005.

Based on Mastery's record of sending more than 90 percent of its graduates to college, the school district authorized Mastery to convert three struggling middle schools into charters.

"The big surprise for me, personally, and I think for the organization is . . . just how personally satisfying and exciting conversions are," Gordon said.

"We feel part of the larger system. We're not off to the side. We feel we're addressing a problem for neighborhoods and the city."

He added: "We're swinging for the fences. We're trying to develop a model program that prepares kids as well as anyone in the United States."

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