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A New Game In Town: Hockey Schools Or Hockey Factories?

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- When you send your kids off to school for the day, you expect them to get better at math, science, and social studies.

But how about hockey?

Just since last year, two new hockey-intensive private schools opened in the Twin Cities, geared toward producing top talent by offering ice time and elite coaching as part of every school day.

"I looked at the model of the music schools, the fine arts schools, and figured why can't we do something with athletics?" said Dave Snuggerud, who founded Breakaway Academy in Chaska last year.

At the Chaska Community Center, Breakaway's fifth through eighth graders spend about an hour a day on the ice.

And the coaching credentials are impressive.

"We have a couple of former NHL players that are part of our coaching staff," said Andy Brink, Breakaway's director of hockey development and a former Gophers player himself. "No question that their hockey experience here is going to make them a better hockey player."

But what about academics? Are parents sacrificing education for the sake of hockey?

"When they first approached us about Breakaway Academy, we were very skeptical," said Joan Koster, whose son Mike is an eighth grader at Breakaway. "We knew the hockey side of it would be very good, but our most important aspect was the academics."

Breakaway's classrooms are just downstairs from the rink.

"I tell parents we're a traditional school in a nontraditional setting," said Jeff Metzler, Breakaway's math teacher and assessment coordinator. "All our teachers are certified teachers with Masters in education."

The setting is in Snuggerud's wheelhouse. A Gophers captain, 1988 Olympic team member and NHL player, he earned his Masters degree in education after his playing career ended, and taught middle school for 18 years at Wayzata.

"We can incorporate a lot of athletic things into our curriculum," Snuggerud said. "We'll look at physics, and we'll talk about the flex in a hockey stick, and that motivates the kids to do well too."

Less than 80 percent on a test? They can't go on the ice.

Jack Seaverson is a fifth grader here.

"He loves it," said his father, John Seaverson. "So if you ask Jack why he's here, he would say it's for the hockey. Now if you asked (my wife) and I, we'd say it's because of the academics and the instructors."

They left Minnetonka to enroll here.

"Which is a good public school program," Seaverson said, "so the academics here had to surpass that, which was tough. And they have.

"I think that's the biggest misconception, is everybody thinks they're sending their kids here because they're gonna be the next Wayne Gretzky or Mario Lemieux and that's just not the case. The thing that sold us was the small class size and the individual attention."

But of course hockey is part of it. Why else would they be here, when there are lots of private schools with small class sizes. Hockey is the hook here.

"That is our trigger to attract them," Snuggerud said. "Once they come into our school, they see really the emphasis is all about the education.

"What was very difficult was, there have been online schools out there, and people hear about online schools and they read about online schools, and they quickly associate us with an online school. And we're not."

Across the metro in North St. Paul, that online school is B.E. Emerson Prep Academy, which offers third through 12th graders three hours of ice time every day, and boasts enrollment from across the country and around the world. We reached out to the owners to take a tour and learn about their program, but they declined.

But here's what we know: It opened this fall, in the North St. Paul Community Center, but it used to be called Northern Educate Sports Academy and Achiever Academy High School, until it ran into financial problems last year and two parents bought it to save it from closing. Then Achiever ran into eligibility problems with the state high school league. This year, the new owners changed the name to Bauer-Emerson Prep Academy, then to B. E. Emerson Prep Academy after the hockey equipment maker sued. They arranged for their youth players to have a team in the North St. Paul association, but it isn't eligible for postseason play. They also left the high school league to avoid those eligibility problems and now play a national schedule. While their girls have been winning, their boys have struggled, and traditionalists question the quality of the online education.

One thing there seems to be little question about: More hockey schools are likely on the way soon.

Former NHL player Shjon Podein is considering starting one of his own, likely a new Breakaway branch closer to the metro. He said he's very early in the process, but the interest is there.

"I love those ideas," Podein said. "I just think the more options for families the better, and then they can choose what's right for them."

So why are all these hockey schools suddenly popping up? Simple – the demand is there. When Breakaway launched last year it had 27 kids. Now, a year later, it has 49 – nearly doubling.

"That means what we're doing is working, to me," Metzler said.

Breakaway says a big advantage of its program is it allows kids to be multi-sport athletes while still playing hockey year-round. Since they're getting their hockey practice during the day, they can play other sports at night. Or, participate in other activities likes arts and music. And since Breakaway doesn't have its own teams, the kids play for their hometown associations.

But the biggest question of all is – at $13,000 a year for both B. E. Emerson and Breakaway – will it all be worth it in the end?

Will all the hockey practice put them ahead of their peers?

"We always tell the parents, we can't guarantee anything," Brink said. "There's no guarantee that anyone that comes to our school is automatically going to be the best player on their team, but what we can guarantee is that they're going to have a great school day experience, they're going to get a lot of attention, and we're going to help them as best as we can to reach their potential."

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