Schools that narrowly avoided the state's first round of "restructuring" on Thursday will be under pressure to make big improvements, and even those that scored much higher are not free to coast.

Under restructuring, the authority over key decisions is shifted from school principals to regional school superintendents, who can contract with private companies to train teachers and adjust curriculum. The changes have been triggered by the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

To avoid such a state takeover, schools had to demonstrate that at least 10 percent of their students are proficient in math, and that 30 percent have adequate reading skills. The new tests will require that 28 percent meet the math standards, and 44 percent hit the reading goals.

Schools that don't measure up when test scores are released in August could be restructured if their students' scores have been too low for several years. Other schools could move a step closer to such action.

It would not be surprising if additional schools are restructured, but it's important to realize that many that had been headed in that direction were able to reverse course, said Robert McClelland, planning and evaluation director for the state Department of Education.

"That indicates to me that it's possible for those types of schools to make a turnaround," he said.

Nanakuli Elementary pulled itself from the restructuring list by making some of the state's biggest gains on the Hawai'i State Assessment test. That required a major effort by everyone at the school, said principal Wendy Takahashi.

"We worked our bottoms off," she said.

Nanakuli has enlisted the help of two of the service providers that will be brought in on a bigger scale to help the 24 schools being restructured.

These providers, the National Center on Education and the Economy and the ETS Pulliam, have helped Nanakuli align its curriculum to test standards and be more successful in areas such as leadership, professional development and parental involvement, Takahashi said.

She warns that even with such external help, the changes will not occur overnight. Nanakuli has been working at it for more than eight years, she said.

"We've been working really hard for many years and we've turned a corner where we're starting to see some evidence of that hard work," she said.

Board of Education chairman Breene Harimoto said schools being restructured need support, and shouldn't be ostracized or abandoned.

"I'm concerned that some schools may feel like they failed, and that's not the case," he said. "They haven't failed. They just need more help."

Some schools may need more help than others, depending on the populations they serve. A school can make the "Adequate Yearly Progress" required on test scores, but still face restructuring if specific groups of students score too low.

Poor test scores for a low-income child with learning disabilities are counted in at least three different student categories, and any one of them can impact the entire school.

"Those scores are used three times against you," said Elaine Christian, principal of Hilo Intermediate.

As a whole, the school made adequate progress last year. But it's still going to be restructured, because those groups of students scored too low. Christian said the school's staff has made a major effort to boost achievement, but that some students are poorly prepared when they enroll.

"We've taken the fluff out of the curriculum, and the whole school's on a standards-based curriculum," Christian said. "We track our data and we do all the right stuff, but it's the kids, in the end, who do not make the test scores."

McClelland said some O'ahu schools near public housing face similar challenges, because many students who live there come from low-income families and have limited English skills.

"I think it's a challenge for them, but it's not an insurmountable challenge," he said. "There are schools across the country that deal with those same sub-populations, and they do very well. I would hate to say that just because you have a lot of kids coming from a housing project, you give up. I think it's a matter of finding a trigger: What do we do that will really work for them?"