During the 1997-98 school year, the Sentry Hill School District made the decision to "redesign" Clayton Elementary School after persistently low student achievement placed the district in the lowest category of the district's accountability system. This case study outlines the changes made at the school. Redesigning the school meant removing all extant staff and hiring an all new staff during the summer of 1999. Most of the decisions about the redesign and how resources would be reallocated to fund it were made by the redesign team. A plan was developed with input from the community that had: (1) a whole-school reform model; (2) an emphasis on literacy; (3) new math and reading curricula; (4) an additional hour of instructional time 4 days a week; (5) reduced class sizes of about 15 students per classroom; (6) inclusion of special-education students in regular classrooms; (7) organizing the school into both vertical and horizontal teams; and (8) providing daily, collaborative planning time for teams of teachers. Many decisions regarding resource reallocation were made by the district. The school has made tremendous strides toward improving literacy among its students, though it is too early to say whether these efforts will result in an increase in student achievement scores. (RT)