The halls are empty and, just outside the high school's row of front doors, a green dumpster teems with broken chairs, torn anatomy charts and battered file cabinets.

Inside, rows of blue lockers gleam under bright lights and the squeak of sneakers can be heard on a shiny basketball court. Some new equipment is expected to be installed in classrooms for students scheduled to arrive Aug. 20 for the first day of school.

The physical cleanup and face-lift of Manual High School began months ago.

But it wasn't until last week that the school arguably put its most vital piece into place - a new principal. Now the clock is ticking to hire teachers, approve a curriculum and attract students to a school that, for years, was synonymous with failure.

Robert Stein is ready.

"We need to get started," he said just hours after being named to the school's top post.

Before Stein took the job at Manual, the northeast Denver school was doing so poorly that more than half the students who live in its attendance area opted for other schools. Grades suffered, test scores slid and the school went through a personality crisis when it was divided into three different campuses.

Finally, a little more than a year ago, the Board of Education voted to close Manual, with hopes to reopen it this fall with just a freshman class - additional grades will be added in years following - and restore it to a prestigious school. To the kind of school parents would gladly send their children. To the kind of school Stein graduated from in 1978.

"It matters to me," he said. "It's a chance to make a difference."

A community's wrath

The stakes are high.

Superintendent Michael Bennet and school board members incurred the wrath of the community when the school was closed, and district officials had meeting after meeting with neighborhood groups trying to explain why the decision was made.

Bennet has high expectations, saying Stein will be "instrumental in creating a premier high school."

Stein, sitting last week in the foyer of his still-current principal's office at Graland Country Day School, said he doesn't feel pressure - even though he's in the unusual, though not exclusive, circumstance of reporting directly to Bennet. His contract begins July 1, but he's unofficially started on the job already.

"I'm pretty high energy. I'm a marathon runner, and so I can set a pace and hang on for quite a long time. I've had other intensive projects or experiences where I think other people preceded me and felt that the work was overwhelming, and I managed to just kind of live my life and get it done," he said. "I'm an efficient worker, too. I write quickly and I can multitask pretty well."

Using a combination of accumulated personal time, vacation days and spring break, Stein's focus will be laserlike on Manual, but there is no doubt he will have to multitask between the two campuses.

He's already facing a series of scheduling commitments.

Last Friday, he met with district officials to go over Denver Public Schools' curriculum. Stein, 46, said he's not wedded to it, but also said he hasn't seen any glaring problems with it.

"There's a lot of good people doing a lot of good work at DPS, and I have no desire to change what they're doing unless, after I examine it, there are reasons that I think we could do better," Stein said.

Interest is widespread

Stein needs to get a faculty of about 13 teachers in place, as well as support staff. He also has the option to hire an assistant principal or use that money for other, unspecified needs.

Internal DPS teacher candidates are supposed to interview next week for job openings and external candidates in mid-April - though word about the Manual openings isn't exactly a secret.

In fact, news has spread so fast that there is interest in the positions from as far away as Iraq and Mexico.

"I expected a nationwide search, not a global one," Stein said with a chuckle, adding that an e-mail came from a U.S. Marine whose deployment in Iraq ends this spring. The Marine hopes to be a teacher this fall at Manual.

Stein said he's not worried about the talent pool, even with the tight deadlines. But he has to get teachers in place soon.

Kim Knous Dolan, special assistant to the superintendent, said there may be a summer academy at Manual to bring struggling students up to speed before school officially starts. And Stein said he's never started a school year as principal without some kind of retreat with teachers to make sure everyone is on the same page.

He said he doesn't expect this time to be an exception.

In addition, Stein has to look at how many students the district can expect for the incoming freshman class. DPS officials have a target of 170 students. There are 390 eligible students in the Manual area.

Stein is also in the midst of deciphering what amount of his $1.2 million budget is discretionary - one of many learning curves in his transition from private school to public school.

"When I look at a public school budget, it's hard for me to even understand some of the questions I was getting at - how much money do I actually have to spend?" Stein said. "In (Graland), if a board member asked me how much money do we actually have to spend, it would be inexcusable to not have a specific answer to that question."

Then there is also the community pressure.

Stein is scheduled to hold a community meeting Monday. He also wants to meet with principals at elementary and middle schools that will become the backbone of the feeder pattern for Manual's future student body.

Nate Howard, principal at Smiley Middle School, has talked to Stein and believes the new Manual principal will be successful in attracting students.

"It's his attitude that I'm confident in," Howard said. "It's his belief - I know it sounds corny - that our students can learn and deserve an opportunity to learn."

Decision too late?

There is some concern in the community, however, that the district took too long to hire Stein.

By being more than a month behind in making the decision, parents have already begun making plans for where their children will go to school, and some of the best teachers may have already committed to teach elsewhere.

John McBride, who had a son at Manual last year before he transferred to South High School, said he likes what he's heard from Stein but admits there is still a slight undercurrent of mistrust toward DPS after the way the Manual closing was handled.

"Now we finally have a principal that can drive the curriculum and and go to the community to start selling," McBride said. "But we're three months behind in marketing to potential Manual students."

But Knous Dolan, the special assistant to Bennet, said DPS has been working on Manual so Stein could hit the ground running. Included in that, she said, were renovations and getting potential Manual athletics teams on schedules to compete next year.

Stein is also optimistic everything can be done and is anxious to talk to people such as McBride, who is also vice president of the Northeast Community Congress for Education.

Mostly, Stein wants to listen.

"I would rather first get to know parents and ask them what they want from Manual. That's one of the great opportunities here - they get to be a part of that process, too," Stein said. "I'm not ready to say these are the reasons you should come to Manual.

"I think it would be better to work with them and identify the factors they most need from a school and make sure we deliver on that."

Robert Stein's to-do list

Manual High School Principal Robert Stein has a lot of assignments before school starts in the fall.

• Find staff: Hire 13 teachers and support staff from local and nationwide searches

• Meet-and-greet 1: Meet with teachers union officials

• Seal of approval: Approve curriculum

• Meet-and-greet 2: Schedule several meetings with community members about what they want to see from Manual High School

• Face time with the staff: Schedule working retreat with faculty

• Meet-and-greet 3: Talk with principals and faculty at feeder schools for Manual

• Money, money, money: Break down $1.2 million budget and figure out where to spend the money

monterod@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5236

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