Quiata Whaley, 13, marvels at the changes at the Shoemaker School in West Philadelphia.

The rooms and the hallways have been brightened with pastel paint. Students are wearing school uniforms. There are new rules and a new staff. No more food fights in the cafeteria, no scuffles in the hallway. And when it's time to change classes, students walk in single file behind a teacher who escorts them.

"As soon as I walked into the school, I knew it was different," said Whaley, who is in eighth grade. "I felt like they were watching out for us. "

For years, Shoemaker, on Media Street, was one of the school district's most troubled schools, plagued by low test scores and violence. This year, it has been reborn as the Mastery Charter School-Shoemaker Campus.

Because of Mastery Charter 's success the last five years with high school students at its Center City campus, district officials turned to Mastery to take on Shoemaker.

This isn't the first time the district has tried something new at Shoemaker. A company managed the school in 2002-03 but was fired after the district found little improvement. Test scores went up after the district regained control but remain low.

Scott Gordon, Mastery's chief executive officer, said the goal was to transform Shoemaker - whose assault rate of 8.1 per 100 students last year placed it among the most violent schools in the district - into a safe school where students want to excel and prepare for college.

"There is a sense of excitement in the community, in that it's something fresh, it's something new," said Robert Lewis, the principal, who has attended community meetings and visited students' homes.

"I'm impressed with how they are running the school and the curriculum they set up," said Dawn Nembhard, whose son William, 12, is in seventh grade.

She home-schooled him last year and would never have enrolled him at Shoemaker if it had not become a charter.

"It's 1,000 percent better than the old Shoemaker," she said.

Mastery's Shoemaker campus opened in September with 208 seventh and eighth graders. It will eventually grow to 714 students in seventh through 12th grades.

"They have a superb model," said Paul Vallas, district chief executive. "It's a college-bound culture. . . . And everything about the operation of the school reinforces that notion. "

Shoemaker is Mastery's second charter conversion, but it likely won't be its last. Last year, Mastery turned Thomas Middle School in South Philadelphia into a charter. The district is negotiating with Mastery to make Pickett Middle School in Germantown a charter next fall.

The conversions are part of the district's plan to phase out middle schools and create more small high schools, Vallas said.

He said he was impressed by Mastery's solid curriculum and its approach to learning. Students must show "mastery" by earning a grade of at least 76 percent before they advance to the next level.

The focus on academics has helped students at Thomas do better on state tests. Last year, the number of eighth graders scoring proficient or higher on state tests increased from 29.1 percent to 39.2 percent in reading and from 39.1 percent to 44.4 percent in math.

The Mastery program also includes a longer school day and school year, mandatory tutoring for struggling students, and smaller classes (no more than 25 students at the middle schools and 23 at the high school). Progress reports are sent to parents every six weeks.

The students sign contracts pledging not to engage in violence. And parents and the school sign contracts pledging to do "whatever is necessary" to help the student excel.

But Gordon, the chief executive, said the most critical ingredients were Mastery's focus on social and emotional learning and creating a positive school culture.

"Our approach is not metal detectors and security guards," he said. "The approach is to build a school community that supports and polices itself. Our deans of students are really proactive - combination of disciplinarians and social workers who work with kids before problems arise and work closely with parents. "

The school also follows what Gordon called a "restorative justice" approach to discipline.

"When there's a problem - someone has graffitied the bathroom, or there was a breach of our nonviolence contract - it's discussed publicly," he said. "The person needs to apologize to the community and to restore whatever injury was done. "

He said the approach not only was more effective but also taught students life skills: "We're probably going to have safer schools, and we're going to have adults who eventually graduate who are able to succeed and function in the real world. "

Each student wears a lanyard that includes an ID and a card for recording good deeds as well as demerits. Three demerits equal an after-school detention.

Mastery operates three schools in Philadelphia: a charter high school, which opened in 2001 and where students apply to attend and are chosen by lottery, and the two former district schools, which draw students from their neighborhoods.

The high school, whose seniors had a 97 percent college-acceptance rate in 2006, has earned national accolades. In 2005, the U.S. Department of Education named Mastery one of 15 "Exemplar" charters. That year, the NewSchools Venture Fund of California awarded Mastery a $2.65 million grant to expand its model.

Only a few students declined to join Mastery's model at Shoemaker and were allowed to transfer to other schools in West Philadelphia. None of Shoemaker's teachers applied to stay. Mastery hired 13 teachers, most certified and with three to five years of experience. Many came from out of state.

Ajaka Roth, who had taught at two public schools in Brooklyn, N.Y., moved to Philadelphia to teach English at Mastery's Shoemaker campus.

"I actually was looking at charter schools all over the country," said Roth, 25. "I was just blown away by this program. "

As a charter, Mastery will receive $7,248 from the district for each student and $15,346 total for each special-education student.

But to make sure the Mastery culture takes hold at Shoemaker, Gordon said, the charter expects to spend an additional $1 million. The extra money will come from fund-raising, with help from the businesspeople on its high-powered board.

Mastery is renting the building, which will undergo $8 million in renovations, including air-conditioning, science labs, and a state-of-the-art music room. The district is expected to reimburse Mastery for those costs.

But creating a new culture at a school takes time. After the first-week orientation, Shoemaker students were supposed to know the school's code of conduct and its mission.

"You know the rules," William Nembhard said, "so if you break them, you have no excuse. "

Demerits are handed out swiftly, including for talking in the hallway or being late.

"The first day I was, like, 'It is strict in here! ' " Quiata Whaley said. "But I know why they're doing it. They don't want the kids being disrespectful. "

By design, the staff is especially strict during the first weeks.

"I think if we pay attention to a lot of the smaller things, it doesn't give the opportunity for larger problems to grow," said Lewis, the principal.

Gordon said the transition had been more difficult at Shoemaker than at Thomas. The second week of school, 130 of Shoemaker's 208 students had after-school detentions or were sent to homework club for failing to complete assignments. Thirteen who skipped homework club were suspended for a day, and their parents had to accompany them when they returned.

"It's like shock therapy," Gordon said. "Kids want to know if we're real. . . . We want to leave no uncertainty that we are 100 percent real. If we accomplish that in the first few weeks, then everything becomes possible. "

Contact staff writer Martha Woodall at 215-854-2789 or martha.woodall@phillynews.com.

 Mastery Charter Schools

High School

35 S. Fourth St.

425 ninth through 12th graders.

It was founded in 2001 as a traditional charter school known as High Tech High Charter School.

Thomas Campus

927 Johnston St.

345 seventh through ninth graders.

It was converted from a district school in 2005.

Shoemaker Campus

5301 Media St.

208 seventh and eighth graders.

It was converted from a district school in 2006.

For more information on Mastery Charter Schools, go to http://go.philly.com/mastery