Chinquapin junior Ram Quiñones is spending the fall semester at High Mountain Institute, a non-profit educational organization located in Leadville, Colorado, that focuses on educating teenagers through interaction with the natural world...

Nayib Morán’s story of how he made his way to Chinquapin is familiar: It was 2003, and he was a student at Briscoe Elementary in Houston’s East End. Patrick Lohan, a longtime Chinquapin teacher (of advanced Spanish and Texas history, not to mention...