The Pathfinder community is a firm believer that building condition does not make a school program.

But with the floor literally crumbling beneath their feet in the rundown Genesee Hill building and little hope from the strapped Seattle School district to fix millions in upgrades and repairs, they don't have much choice.

Genesee Hill, home to the Pathfinder Alternative K-8 program since 1994, was built as a temporary site in the 1940s to house an overflow of students from other neighborhood schools. Left out of capital levies and some say physically neglected, the district has declared the facility unfit for any educational program.

But the staff would rather stay where they are than move to a building that is too big, too small, or that threatens the structure of their program.

Chris Quigley, a sixth and seventh grade teacher at Pathfinder, said it's not the infusion of cash that makes the school work.

"They give us lemons and we make lemonade," said Quigley. "We have nothing but we've made it our own and spent so much energy and time making it a community."

Teachers bring in refurbished computers and spend their own money on basic supplies to fill in the gaps, he said.

During the winter it can get down to 52 degrees in K-1 teacher Janet Osborn's room because of poor insulation and old windows that need to be replaced. Despite those challenges, the staff has tried to focus their energy where it's needed most; on the students.

"The building is not the important part, it's what you do with it," said Osborn. "I think most of the time (the building) doesn't matter."

Ask any staff member and they'll say regardless of what they've been given, they've built a strong community. It's that and other key aspects of the program, class structure, expeditionary learning and an embedded Native American curriculum component that make Pathfinder alternative said David Dockendorf, Pathfinder's principal of eight years.

The K-5 curriculum emphasizes learning by doing. Teachers connect learning to adventure through a variety of project based learning expeditions that integrate core curriculum based on Washington academic standards.

Student clanships of bats, wolves, foxes and falcons spend their mornings hard at work on core curriculum, but come afternoon they explore history and cultures through expedition adventures.

"We don't use district adopted curriculum per say," said Dockendorf. "Students are still working on state standards, but in an exciting way."

The projects usually last about half the school year and involve fieldwork and hands-on learning techniques to promote deeper connections through themes.

Last year, students discovered different cultures through bread and learned about the history of civil rights through the struggles of migrant farm workers. Osborn's Salmon Clan is learning about math, science and culture through different types of trees.

"The best thing about it is it can reach any child at any level because they are long-term, deeply grounded somatic units," said Osborn. "We're giving kids strategies to learn, and because we go so deep into one subject, it roots those strategies."

This integrated approach to learning is what prompted Jennifer Giomi to enroll her two children at Pathfinder.

"I like that method because that's how we use these subjects in every day life," said Giomi. "It makes it more relevant. It's much more like a private school teaches."

Another big draw for Giomi was Pathfinder's mixed age class structure.

In a mixed-age classroom, children stay with the same teacher for two years. This is a good way to promote leadership in the older students and higher academic achievement in the younger, said Osborn.

Also students are able to spend several years with the same teacher, allowing the teacher to develop a deeper understanding of a student's strengths and needs.

The middle school lives in the outer islands, or, rather, 12 on-site portables. Expeditionary learning has not yet been successful with those grades because of the six-period day structure, said Dockendorf. But students get their creative juices flowing another way.

To break up the monotonous cycle of reading, writing and arithmetic students get the chance to engage in an activity of choice for several hours a week, like hip-hop dancing or cooking. This allows students to learn more about each other and their teachers, said Quigley.

"Students need to see the other side of us, that we are not just that teacher from room 304 that bores them to death," said Quigley, who has taught at Pathfinder for the past 12 years. "They see the passion we have in our lives and it motivates them."

Another important component of Pathfinder is its dedication to honoring Native American traditions in curriculum and school practices.

But the school has taken flack from the Native American community for being inappropriate in the way it emphasizes Native culture.

More than half of Pathfinder's student body is white.

"People have said we are playing being Indian," said Quigley. "We are trying to figure out how not to do that."

The staff consults with tribal leaders and works with the Huchoosedah Indian Education Program to help form its Native American components, but there are still challenges, said Dockendorf.

"Do we do it perfectly? No. Do we need to do more professional development? Yes," he said.

The school's population of Native American students has fallen from 20 percent to 8 percent in the last several years. Dockendorf said the growing expense of living in Seattle has likely been a factor.

"People have had to head south and we've lost a lot of families," he said.

But Native American culture continues to be an integral part of the program and there are no plans to discontinue it.

"It's still at the core of our curriculum," said Quigley. "It's something every school should do because this is Native land and we are on it."

Like many students in the district, Pathfinder students have also struggled to meet the standards of the Washington Assessment of Student Learning exam.

This year's fourth grade reading scores have improved over last year but overall most students did not meet the state's standards for math. Fourth grade writing scores are up by more than half, but 7th grade reading scores declined.

"We are focusing our attention on the (test) with more intention," said Dockendorf. "But we want to keep in perspective that it's only one form of assessment that shows the progress of our school. We know there's a whole lot more that goes on in a school that shows successes."

Now that passing the exam is a high school graduation requirement, Pathfinder has had to stray a little from its alternative philosophy that places less value on test scores than more traditional programs.

There's some worry that teachers will start teaching to the test, said Dockendorf.

"That's our struggle on a daily basis," he said. "In light of standards and the (Washington Assessment of Student Learning), it's become more challenging to maintain an alternative spirit and at the same time meet all the standards."

But the question of where the program will go still remains and Pathfinder is paying close attention.

The program has been one of several targets in the school closure and consolidation process, in which the School Board has been struggling to close 10 schools to stave off a projected multi-million dollar deficit.

Earlier this year, a proposal to move the program to the Louisa Boren interim site was abandoned. Then, a last ditch effort to merge Pathfinder with the traditional Cooper School was cancelled after both schools said it would destroy their programs.

"I really love this school and it has worked for my kids so far," said Giomi. "But Pathfinder won't have the ability to grow to its potential if it stays where it is."