e only other school with commensurate academic quality is Russell A. Conwell Middle Magnet School, whose entry standards are so high that many students in the area would not be able to qualify for entrance. Area parents questioned about the schools replied their children were taught barely enough to be moved through the school system and not enough to qualify them for the magnet programs, indicating that the students are "like a commodity being moved from place to place" ("Strategic Business Plan," 2004, p. 42).
HPE has both strengths and weaknesses in relation to its competitors. On the plus side, unlike the other schools, it treats its students as whole individuals rather than just meeting strictly their academic needs. It describes its purvey as "Quality education focusing on the academic, moral, physical, social, and spiritual development of the child" ("Strategic Business Plan," 2004, p. 3). In addition, as a private school, it has structured itself independently of the norm. It is a coed
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