Despite the disappearance of most of the steel mills from our region, the assembly-line method is alive and well. It can be observed nearly intact in many of our high schools.

The traditional high school structure emerged as a parallel to the factory model that saw a division of labor, mechanical routines and large-scale production as the most efficient way to make things -- whether the products were steel beams, automobiles or productive citizens.

Consider the origins of seven classes a day, 45 minutes each, in rooms filled with students sitting in orderly rows writing down notes and completing repetitive exercises in preparation for multiple-choice exams. This is an efficient method of material production, but it's no way to educate human beings.

Under such conditions, it should not be surprising that the "products" these industrial-era schools release into our communities often lack the ability to collaborate with others and engage in the critical analysis necessary for success in a complex society. Many of our young people are set adrift in a world they don't fully understand and have few skills to influence.

Unlike a bad batch of cars with malfunctioning gas pedals, though, we can't simply announce a recall and send them all back to the dealership to be fixed. Nor can we throw more money and technology at the problem, assuming that a laptop for every child and "smart" boards in every classroom will make up for an outdated model of teaching and learning based on structures of a bygone era.

What is desperately needed is a change in the understanding of the high school teacher's role and a dramatic shift in school design. Instead of demanding that high school teachers be subject experts alone, we should expect them to be experts in student development, capable of forming strong academic relationships and constructing bridges to the wisdom and knowledge that lie beyond school walls.

The notion that teachers should be highly skilled in developing relationships is commonplace at the elementary level, but discussions of education reform, both locally and nationally, continue to ignore the central role academic relationships play at all levels of education.

It is primarily in high school that the jarring shift to assembly-line methods creates a disturbing disconnect between students and teachers, and between schools and the world outside. It is also in high school that teachers most often use their subject-matter expertise and methods of lecture and memorization to avoid deep involvement in their students' lives. How else can they cope with the constant turnover of students, period to period and year to year?

The latest education reforms suggested by the U.S. Secretary of Education and leaders in the Pittsburgh Public Schools are more enlightened than those of the past, but they will have little impact if they do not challenge these basic realities with greater seriousness.

The assembly-line structure ignores that learning is built on relationships. Anyone who has watched a toddler learning to walk or forming her first words will not find it controversial that children learn in large part through interaction with other humans.

What may be less obvious is that this same process of modeling behavior by interacting with people we trust is just as important in learning algebra, U.S. history, world literature or physics. To transform high schools in ways that prepare students for the complexities of today's world, we must redefine the role of teachers to better reflect this insight. Such a transformation requires fundamental changes.

City Charter High School, a public charter school with open-enrollment and no admission requirements, has taken significant steps in this direction by keeping students with the same teachers for all four years of high school. In the language of education, this is called "looping."

Interdisciplinary groups of teachers share responsibility for 150 students from ninth grade through graduation. Common planning time and an open office foster regular collaboration. Teacher teams enjoy considerable autonomy over curriculum and methods of teaching while relying on administrators, counselors and office staff for support, professional development and organizational unity.

This model helps develop the strong academic relationships essential for learning. Over the past eight years, this has helped empower teachers at City High to create programs within their disciplines that develop students' abilities to understand advanced concepts and engage with the outside world, while still learning basic skills, facts and ideas.

Programs developed by teachers in the social studies department provide just two examples of the innovation possible under conditions designed to encourage academic relationships.

The 12th-grade social studies program starts by discussing interviews Bill Moyers conducted with seminal thinkers for his series, "A World of Ideas." These interviews explore questions essential to understanding our roles as Americans and as global citizens.

Throughout the year, seniors are exposed to a variety of disciplines -- anthropology, political science, philosophy, psychology, economics, comparative religion -- as they are in many traditional high schools. But at City High, the strong academic relationships we've built with our students since ninth grade allow us to tailor lessons to their individual learning styles and to more thoroughly address their questions about social studies and life in general.

As the year proceeds, the students prepare for class discussions with adults from various walks of life -- discussions initiated by the students based on their own research and questions. These conversations focus not only on learning what adults know about their fields of endeavor, but also on how they find meaning in life and navigate their way through its many challenges.

Over the years, our students have talked with civil rights leader John Lewis, now a congressman from Georgia; Saleem Ghubril, director of the Pittsburgh Promise; Vernell Lillie of Kuntu Repertory Theater; Sky Forester, then-president of the World Affairs Council of Pittsburgh; Khet Mar, Burmese poet, political activist and "Writer in Residence" with City of Asylum/Pittsburgh; Suzanne Walsh, formerly of the Heinz Endowments; former Pittsburgh councilman Sala Udin, who now leads the CORO Foundation; Liz Coleman, president of Bennington College in Vermont; entrepreneur David Iwinski; Duquesne professor Launcelot Brown and many others.

Almost invariably, students say they remember these discussions most of all from their senior year and value them as guides for leading successful lives after graduation.

This same process is employed at a global level through our annual International Service Learning Program, which culminates in a 12-day expedition to Costa Rica for 18 of our most adventurous 11th- and 12th-grade students.

This trip differs significantly from the typical educational travel tour because it concentrates on engaging with political, cultural and environmental leaders and working side-by-side with local community organizers to address basic needs of the most vulnerable in Costa Rican society. These experiences offer students new ideas for addressing complex challenges, such as poverty, disease and economic dislocations due to international trade. They also provide international perspectives on how to lead meaningful lives, perspectives that the students can compare with those of the American adults they've talked with in an effort to sort out their own values and life choices.

The 12th-grade social studies course and the International Service Learning Program help students develop skills in research, reading, writing, speaking, interviewing and critical thinking, all of which serve them well in the workplace, college and broader life. At the same time, we haven't sacrificed the teaching of content by pursuing these relationship-based learning experiences. In fact, our seniors are significantly more motivated to learn as much as possible so they can engage at a high level with one another and with adults, even in their last few months of senior year.

These practices require teachers to have a different set of skills than they need for traditional instruction, but they are not inherently more time-consuming or challenging -- as long as training, policies and school structures are adjusted to make them possible. They also require a conscious focus on building academic relationships and a willingness to accept more "messiness" in the learning process.

While this model may not fit the calculated precision of the assembly line, it is far more likely to develop the educated citizens we need to achieve economic, social and political health in a post-industrial society.

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