Superintendent Kelvin Adams meets with students at McKinley Classical Junior Academy in 2008. Emily Rasinski | Post-Dispatch

When classes begin Aug. 20, some 1,300 students in five of the St. Louis Public Schools’ 51 elementary schools will embark on an even grander adventure than usual: They’ll be attending so-called “pilot” schools.

Highly motivated teachers and principals, all of whom volunteered for the assignment, have been given authority to pursue their best vision for meeting students’ learning needs — free from red tape and gray bureaucracy.

The decision is a significant shift away from reliance on a central administration that, historically, has been static and mired in adult problems. It’s a movement toward the district’s best hope — energetic principals, teachers and community members willing to take risks in the quest for student achievement.

Pilot schools try to steer a middle course between traditional and charter schools. Autonomy is the main strategy. In Boston, where the movement began, pilot school leaders have flexibility in developing school curriculum, control over budgets and staffing and freedom from many central-office directives and union work rules.

Pilots also work to promote a special school spirit and attract involved parents and community members.

The pace of St. Louis’ pilot school experiment has been encouraging. District Superintendent Kelvin Adams began moving on pilots within months of his appointment in November. He invited — but did not require — elementary school principals to submit detailed proposals outlining their education vision and plans, how they would organize internally and involve the surrounding community, what freedom they sought and how they proposed to use it.

Mr. Adams received proposals from nine schools. The principals at the five that were chosen — Froebel, Herzog, Hodgen, Jefferson and Mason — have been given permission to pursue innovative strategies for improving student performance. The offerings range from special reading clinics to integrating arts instruction in order to help children break through on “three Rs” curricula.

Mr. Adams is quick to note that selecting just five as the pioneers does not imply other pilot proposals weren’t worthy. It was a matter of helping ensure the success of the first wave by making it manageable in size and scale, he said.

Indeed, the St. Louis pilots will not enjoy anything approaching full autonomy envisioned by the pilot concept — at least initially. But they have been given significant freedom and, thanks to cooperation from the teachers union, flexibility to build and train their staffs.

By the district’s traditional standards, this represents brainstorming and experimentation at break-neck speed. No one is arguing that the pilot schools are the only answer to years of poor performance, only that the new approach is worth a shot.

St. Louis may be poised to enter an especially vibrant period of urban public education — especially as well-conceived and well-resourced KIPP and foreign-language immersion charter schools coming on line. Independent pilot schools could become key players in this vibrant mix.

Even during its times of greatest despair, St. Louis Public Schools always had a broad cadre of motivated teachers, principals and administrators doing what needed to be done and giving the children their all, no matter what.

They should see the pilot program as vindication — and official validation — of their work. The entire community is rooting for them.