SAN ANTONIO -- More than 80 students wearing shirts emblazoned with “Be the Change” are the Class of 2013, the first freshman class at KIPP University Prep High School located at what once was St. John the Evangelist Catholic School at 128 S. Audubon.

KIPP, also known as the Knowledge Is Power Program, has 82 schools nationwide in underserved, mostly minority, communities. Aspire Academy, a middle school, opened here in 2003 and has scored highly in state test scores.

“Our goal is to increase the college-going rate inside Loop 410,” said Principal Joel Harris. “It takes more time. It takes high expectations. It takes rigorous curriculum. It takes people doing whatever it takes people doing, whatever it takes, a longer school day, more time.”

KIPP University Prep begins with a summer session three weeks ahead of the San Antonio Independent School District that starts classes next Monday. It also has a longer school day, at least 10 hours long. Yet, those aren’t the only differences between KIPP University Prep and most public schools.

Although admission is free thanks to state funding and private donations, there is no test to get into the school. Its students, known as scholars, win enrollment in a raffle.

“They pulled my name,” said 9th grader Edward Wahrheit with a smile, one of the new arrivals. “My dad was like real happy.”

And, apparently so is he.

“It’s really cool,” said Wahrheit. “Like, they communicate with you a lot. They get to know you.”

He came from the same public middle school as 13-year-old Toni Torres, who said, “It’s really crazy to switch from one school that’s like that to another one that prepares you for your future, your college.”

“Most of the time, there were no teachers in the classroom,” said Torres. “We had no homework, like, in the whole year."

And now, at KIPP, homework is called life work.

“They grade you for everything,” she said. “They have a point to what they’re doing.”

At KIPP only two weeks, Wahrheit said he and other University Prep students spent a day at the University of Texas at San Antonio and stayed overnight in a dormitory at Our Lady of the Lake University.

Where would he be were it not for KIPP University Prep?

“Probably in trouble somewhere,” said Wahrheit, who wants to become a real estate agent or an attorney someday.

“I would probably be like maybe dead by now because I would have probably gotten involved in gangs,” said Torres, who now dreams of being a doctor. “I don’t care if they pay me or not. I just want to learn how to save people.”

“It’s more than possible for every one of our students to excel in college and their careers,” said their principal. "We’re 100 percent focused on college preparations every day.”

College pennants and T-shirts even line the halls. Outside each classroom, below each teacher’s name, are their college credentials.

KIPP plans to add a class to University Prep every year and eventually operate 10 elementary, middle and high school campuses by 2017. Reflecting its commitment to serving the inner city, enrollment is limited to students inside Loop 410, excluding Alamo Heights and military bases.