This report is the first in a series exploring a variety of the organizational spaces being developed under strategies to change and improve K-12 education in Minnesota. One strategy seeks to create an environment that focuses on creating new and different schools and with them new choices for students and families. These reports are designed to inform policymakers, educators, families, and others on what has been happening to create new and different schools. This first report is intended to provide background on Minnesota's alternative-education programs, stimulate discussion, and highlight a number of important policy questions. It is not meant to be formal academic research or an exhaustive description of what alternative-education programs are or could be. Alternative-education programs are similar to charter schools in that they create space to design new and different learning models. But they enroll more students. This report specifically addresses the following: (1) what alternative-education programs are; (2) who their students are; (3) how their students differ; (4) what the schools do differently with students; (5) why not much is known about them; and (6) what role they play in the current discussion about creating spaces through which new learning models can emerge. (WFA)