The atmosphere is muted. Along the carpeted hall, a young woman sits in an overstuffed chair as she types on a laptop; a group of students gather around a table, their heads bent together, working on a project. Outside the glass doors, two others stop to chat in the warm sun. The building, and its inhabitants, have the look and feel of any college, any campus. But it’s not. It’s high school.

The Beaufort County Early College High School is a unique, accelerated version of the traditional high school, where in five years, a student may graduate with a high-school diploma and an associate degree. Held in Building 10 on the Beaufort County Community College campus, the school is part of the “New Schools” project of the N.C. Department of Public Instruction. It’s a grants-based project — grants come from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation — allowing students who may have had little opportunity to go to college get a diploma and a degree at no cost.

“The big incentive here is free college,” said Dr. Todd Blumenreich, BCECHS principal.

A former Southside High School principal, Blumenreich was part of the planning committee that recognized the need for a different approach in education and helped write the grants for funding. It started with a question: “What do kids need to be successful at the next level?”

That was four years ago. For two of those four years, BCECHS has been recognized as an honors school of excellence, the highest designation the state of North Carolina gives. And success has come to the BCECHS level — upward of 97 percent of the students enrolled are performing at grade level or above.

The notion that BCECHS culls the most promising eighth-graders from Beaufort County Schools, Blumenreich is quick to correct.

“There’s this misunderstanding that every student we admit is honors student,” he said. “We target three specific groups: the historically underrepresented in post-secondary education, the economically disadvantaged and first generation college-goers.”

Blumenreich claims it’s not the individual students but the environment in which they are taught that has made the difference and allowed these previously “average” students to excel.

“It’s called power of place,” explained Blumenreich. “We put them in an adult environment, expect them to behave like adults. We keep the expectations high.”

That means there’s a lot of freedom at the school, and a noticeable camaraderie between teachers and students. Sophomores in an English 4 class — senior English in the traditional high schools — engage freely in discussion with their instructor. For part of the day, students attend elective classes, which are college classes, and mingle among the older community-college students in buildings across the campus. There is an expectation of maturity, explained Blumenreich, and because it is expected, these average high-school students respond.

The expectations also extend to schoolwork. By the time a student has finished two years at BCECHS, he or she has already completed the high-school core curriculum required by the state. Afterward, they take electives — college classes that count as one credit towards their high-school diploma, one toward their associate degree.

“It’s faster — I’m already in senior English,” said sophomore Hollyanne Rogers, “If I were at Washington High School or Northside or Southside, I’d be a senior.”

The speed and content of the classes make for a nontraditional high school education — one that inspires more independence and critical thinking. For example, when history professor Jeffrey Probert teaches sophomores in his class,“Film vs. History,” students are expected to compare written history with that history’s portrayal on film, then write about it.

“We expect them to write,” Blumenreich stressed, relaying the ways in which the classes and environment go on to better prepare their graduates for their future place in the work force.

Still, the school might be accelerated, but, according to Rogers, there’s still plenty of time to enjoy youth: “I’m pulled out of the high school atmosphere, but I’m OK with that — you still get it here on more of a college level. We still have proms and stuff.”

Currently, BCECHS is recruiting eighth-grade students in Beaufort County. For an application, visit www.beaufort.k12.nc.us. Go to “Schools,” “Beaufort County Early College High School” or call 252-940-6227.