LONGFELLOW

* The school offers classes that aim for a passing grade on the GED test, the diploma equivalency.

They've been free-falling through outstretched hands and folded arms for a long time.

At Dayton City Schools' Longfellow Center, about 120 teen-agers are taking classes in a unique school-age program that prepares them for the test to earn their GED.

PHOTOS BY JIM WITMER DAYTON DAILY NEWS LeOnna Benson (right) reacts to classmate Nina Young's correct answer to a math problem during class at Dayton's Longfellow Center. About 120 teen-agers take classes in a unique school-age program that prepares them for the test to earn their GED.

For many of them, it's their last chance to earn a high school equivalency diploma before they become adults.

They wind up here because they've reached age 16 and have eight or fewer high school credits, the majority having gone no further than part of the way through ninth grade. Some cannot add, while others can barely read. A pre-GED class is offered for students whose skills are below the sixth-grade level.

On a recent day, pre-GED teacher Maxine Rutledge ran her class through basic math problems - simple addition and multiplication - and then had them circle the nouns on a grammar worksheet. Many of her seven students, mostly aged 17 or 18, struggled with the work.

Rutledge is funny and stern, good cop and bad cop - all in one colorful bundle of energy.

"You know you worry me," she says to one misbehaving student who is protesting that he doesn't feel like doing the work. "I might not get my Social Security because you aren't going to be able to get a job."

Most students in the Longfellow program rarely went to school and several dropped out. Their poor school performance was typically linked with involvement in drugs or crime, fighting at school, homelessness, teen pregnancy or troubled home lives. Many have never been able to adjust to mainstream school life.

"We're just looking to give them another chance to start over," said math and science teacher Nancy Browning.

JIM WITMER DAYTON DAILY NEWS At Dayton City Schools' Longfellow Center, Maxine Rutledge readies students for the test to earn their GED. `I think the key to us around here is flexibility,' said Rutledge. `We can't reach everyone. We're not Helen Kellers.'

Classes are small, lessons individualized and very focused on the task at hand, giving these kids the knowledge they need to pass the GED. Students who fail to come to school get a call or visit from teachers.

Several students pointed to ninth grade as the time when things went sour for them in school.

"High school wasn't really my thing. I never went. I just didn't like the high school scene," said Sharon Porcelli, an 18-year-old who earned her GED in January after attending Longfellow. "Here it was smaller so the teachers can work with you one-on-one. That's what I really liked."

Porcelli was 17 and in the ninth-grade when her mother suggested the Longfellow program.

She is not the only student who has found success there. Of the approximately 100 students who take the GED test each year, 85 percent to 90 percent pass.

"I think the key to us around here is flexibility," Rutledge said. "We can't reach everyone. We're not Helen Kellers. We're not miracle workers."