Last semester, Javier Flores nearly lost his grip on a dream.

His report card was littered with C's and D's. He snapped at his mom. And he was angry that a good friend at San Jose's Downtown College Preparatory had been expelled.

His mother was firm: Get your act together or move in with your father in Modesto.

One visit to the Modesto school was motivation enough. ``I was like, `There's no way I'll be able to get to college there,' '' Javier, 15, recalled. ``There were too many kids.''

Today, his dream of becoming the first in his family to go to college is on track.

That same dream has wooed students from San Jose's working-class neighborhoods to Downtown College Prep -- a start-up high school dedicated to teaching them the skills they'll need to thrive at a university. The 102 students in the charter school's first class have come for the high expectations, challenging classes, discipline, structure and personal attention they may not have experienced elsewhere. The teenagers yearn to attend college but most have struggled with academics.

And, nearly to a pupil, they carry the extra weight of their families' hopes for a better future on their shoulders.

Veronica Lugo-Perez feels that weight keenly.

The 14-year-old has family responsibilities that would daunt someone twice her age. Her mother toils 80 hours a week to support four children. So Veronica juggles her homework with cooking, cleaning and helping care for her younger brother.

One recent night, as Veronica cleared a space for studying on the living room desk, her younger sister settled in for her nightly telenovelas and her brothers noisily bounced a basketball outside.

The setting was hardly conducive to completing a class project. But Veronica knows how to filter out distractions. The dark-eyed teen, who is among the school's best students, is focused on a simple dream.

``I just want to go to college,'' Veronica said, looking around her home. ``I want to do better for myself.''


Teen dilemmas and more

Like all teenagers, Veronica and Javier are navigating the straits between childhood and adulthood. They're nearing the end of their freshman year -- a 10-month journey during which students shift to more challenging classes with high stakes. All at once, they're coping with everything from midterms and college-admission tests to shifting friendships and heartbreak.

The pressure is all the more intense at Downtown College Prep because of what many students here lack: experience with honors classwork, healthy family checkbooks and an understanding of what it takes to get to college.

The six instructors cut their students no slack, although they empathize with their struggles. The teachers insist on high standards even as they give the pupils personal attention and encouragement.

For her part, Veronica has always done well in school, but the work is more rigorous and the teachers more demanding than ever at Downtown College Prep. Still, she's pulling down A's and B's and branching out socially, participating in the school's dance squad and mock trial team.

Javier's experiences better reflect those of students suddenly dunked into harder classes than they're used to. He floundered at first, flubbing some tests and bristling at the school's eight-hour day. But the school's culture is ingrained now. And Javier, like many of his classmates, is making huge academic strides.

``Since the beginning of the year, kids said the mantra of `I'm going to college,' '' said Principal Greg Lippman. ``What's increasingly happening is the students are acting in a way that will get them what they say they want.''


`The vision begins'

If the pressure rattles Javier, he hides it well.

The teen with spiky gelled hair and an easy smile radiates confidence. He's a charismatic guy, one who makes classmates laugh without angering his teachers.

He knows the importance of this school's mission, but he doesn't take it too seriously.

Some days, as students scurry toward first period in the church that serves as one of the school's two campuses, Javier will stride up to the principal, shake his hand and ask, ``Mr. Lippman, is it 8:30 yet? The vision begins.'' And at day's end, he'll return. ``Mr. Lippman, is it 4:30 yet? The vision ends.''

The vision of reaching college actually began long ago for Javier.

When he was little, his grandfather drilled Javier with math flashcards at the dining room table. His mother sent him to a private Christian elementary school, where he performed well.

After moving to a public middle school and sliding by academically, Javier chose to attend Downtown College Prep, a charter school that receives public funding but is free from many state education rules.

When freshman year was young -- and everyone was still griping about the school's preppy khakis-and-polo-shirt uniform -- Javier pulled down good grades. But midway through the first semester, he stumbled. He was more interested in hanging out with his friends and listening to CDs than doing algebra, history, English and science.

His mom, Sylvia Asebes, chalked it up to puberty.

After all, she knows teenage rebellion firsthand. Asebes moved in with Javier's dad at 17 and gave birth a year later. A divorced mother of four, she works full time as a customer service representative and lives with her parents near the East San Jose foothills, trying to provide her kids advantages she didn't seize.

``That's why I tell my children my story again and again and again,'' said Asebes, 33. ``I want to embed it.''

As a reality check, she sent Javier and his sister to Modesto during the holidays and asked them to think hard about what they really wanted.

Looking back, Javier said, ``I wasn't taking myself seriously. The more everyone tried to prod me, the more I did worse. The more people gave me a choice, and said, `Make your own decisions,' the better I did.

``The only choice I have now is school -- or leave.''

Javier knows that if he were at San Jose's Lincoln High, the school he was scheduled to attend, he'd be too tempted to hang out with his friends, skip homework and sit ``in the back of the class being a cool guy.''

At Downtown College Prep, teachers call your parents if you miss three homework assignments. If problems persist, parents must sign a homework log every day. To help with the workload, tutors are available every afternoon during tutorial.

``They're not willing to let you slide for any reason at all,'' Javier said.

Once Javier decided to commit to Downtown College Prep, he began the academic turnaround teachers pray for.

Students who bog down in school are like ``a car stuck in sand,'' Principal Lippman said. ``And suddenly, something happens in the subterranean: The car catches, and it hops out of the hole.''

Javier is getting traction now. He's experienced ups and downs this semester, but his last report card contained two A's and two B's along with two D's. He clowns less and raises his hand more in class. And he's shooting for the honor roll.

His best marks come in Aaron Srugis' 20-student math class, where Javier has tugged his grade up to an A-.

``At the beginning of the year, he was right at the pass-fail level, pretty consistently,'' Srugis said. ``Since the new year, he's just exploded -- his drive to the top is breath-taking. He's on fire.''

Javier brings that motivation to other courses too -- even if his grades don't always reflect the effort.

While classmates trickled into science class one recent day, he and his friend Miguel Martinez were already reviewing the parts of the digestive system.

``What's the esophagus?'' Miguel quizzed.

``It carries food from your mouth to the stomach,'' Javier replied.

Miguel joked, ``Shut up, fool, you sound all smart,'' and swiped Javier's notes.

Javier now is so attuned to the school's demanding environment that he plans to stay here even if his family can't. Although Javier's family is well-off compared with some other students at the school, Asebes fears that Silicon Valley's high cost of living could squeeze her family out. If that happens, Javier already has vowed to stay with his grandparents and his school.

Now that Javier has ``analyzed it and thought it over, he knows that DCP is a great opportunity for him,'' Asebes said. ``He knows he's not going to get it back if he doesn't take it.''


Family responsibilities

Veronica has struggles of her own: weighing her academic goals and home responsibilities against the wish to be a ``regular'' teenager.

Depending on the night, Veronica may be found learning a waltz for her quinceañera -- the traditional Mexican celebration of a girl's 15th birthday -- or helping her 11-year-old sister with homework. Or she's fielding phone calls from friends while warming a dinner of beans and tortillas and minding her squirmy 5-year-old brother.

The pressures in Veronica's life come from all sides. Not only is she driven from within, but her family and teachers expect a lot.

Veronica's mom admits to being estricta -- strict -- with a touch of pride. Even though Veronica is earning mostly A's, Maria Perez expects a good explanation for any B's.

She's also forbidden her bubbly daughter from dating and attending school dances.

The rules sometimes seem overprotective to Veronica -- who yearns for a little more freedom. Still, she guiltily acknowledges her mother's sacrifices to secure her children's futures.

Perez says she wants her children to make something of their lives. To work less and earn more than she does. To have easier lives than her own.

The desire for a better life drew Maria Perez and her children to the United States from Mexico's Michoacán state in 1992, when Veronica was 6. Perez's family was poor, and she had attended school for only one year.

``That's why I work like I do,'' said Perez, a 37-year-old with tired eyes. ``What I didn't have, I want them to have.''

Usually cheerful, Veronica doesn't talk much about her obligations at home. She just says she's good at keeping stress inside her and ``juggling things around,'' a phrase she learned at school.

``I think these are, like, chores,'' she said. ``I think this is what normal people do. I guess I'm used to it.'' In the school's hallways, Veronica switches fluidly between the teen vernacular -- where something cool is ``sick'' -- and her school language, where historical dilemmas can be downright ``ambiguous.''

Her teachers describe Veronica as a ``star,'' a student they wish they could clone. She's also exactly the kind of pupil the school meant to attract: one with enormous potential who might not be tapped in a larger school where teachers are too swamped to offer personal attention or draw out shy students.

Veronica and the school are a good match, said math teacher Srugis.

``She asks questions, does her homework, rocks on the tests. Her spirit is never diminished,'' he said. ``I think she believes in herself 100 percent. She believes in the school 100 percent and we believe in her 100 percent.''

Veronica says she appreciates the school's focus, 100-student size and young, idealistic faculty. The young woman occasionally expresses ambivalence about academics -- saying she craves good grades but doesn't want to be a perfectionist. But talking to her instructors -- several of whom battled the odds and stereotypes to get to college -- is usually enough to crank up her motivation.

``The teachers -- they're cool,'' she said. ``They seem to understand us better. And they just came out of college, so they're still fresh on what we need to do to get there.''

By all accounts, Veronica is doing exactly what a college-bound freshman should.

During a recent school tutorial session, while a group of girls read a magazine article provocatively titled ``15 Ways to Get Kicked Out of Class,'' Veronica put the mental blinders on, ignoring the flirtation and obsessive grooming taking place around her.

Her gray backpack on the table in front of her, Veronica pulled out her notebook and a homework log folded into a tiny origami square. She lined up her tools: pens and a rainbow of highlighters. Then she tore through a history assignment on Aztec religion and social structure. With time to spare, she began a timeline about the life of computer pioneer Grace Murray Hopper.

Veronica knows she'll need to work hard for the adult life she's already picturing, complete with a career -- maybe in technology, a shiny BMW convertible and a house where she doesn't share a bedroom.

She gets nothing but encouragement for that vision -- and even loftier aspirations -- at Downtown College Prep.

As Veronica's mom picked her up after school one day, Jennifer Andaluz, Downtown College Prep's executive director, raved about her academic promise. This girl, she said, could go to Stanford.

``Tengo sueños para Veronica,'' Andaluz told Maria Perez. ``I have dreams for Veronica.''