Omaha Film Festival 2009

This is the remarkable story of a K thru 12 school on Chicago's impoverished, high crime West Side, that has been sending 100% of it's graduating seniors to 4 year Colleges and Universities for 30 years in a row. More than half of them are accepted by tier one schools and the class of 2008 was awarded more that $4.5 million in college scholarships. Providence St. Mel is a school that has completely escaped America's educational crisis.The film explores first the tumultuous beginnings of Providence St. Mel as a private school serving the children in a notoriously poor neighborhood. Originally built as a Catholic School in the late 1920s, the Chicago Archdiocese withdrew it's support and wanted to close the school in 1978. At that point, the Principal, Paul J. Adams III refused to close the school and ended up raising money in the community to buy the building from the Sisters Of Providence. So began the legacy of sending students from this underprivileged neighborhood to some of the finest colleges in the country.For 30 years the students of Providence St. Mel have been lifting themselves permanently out of poverty with the power of a competitive, world class education.