Three years ago, the Los Angeles Urban League launched a $25 million, five-year plan to turn around low-performing Crenshaw High School and address the social and economic ills that dominate life in the surrounding 70-block South L.A. neighborhood.

Now, at the project's midway point, Neon Tommy reporters found the Urban League and its partners have made some gains and suffered some setbacks. The partnership is credited with reducing serious crime. But L.A. Unified's school chief, in a chilly e-mail exchange obtained by Neon Tommy, scolded league officials for "lack of progress" at Crenshaw High School. And tax filings show the Urban League is millions of dollars short of its fundraising goal.

For the past four months, reporters immersed themselves in the school and community to measure the Urban League's progress in taking on an array of social forces that make the Park Mesa Heights neighborhood one of the most distressed in Los Angeles.

Our special report includes a day-in-the-life of Crenshaw High School, as students and a warm-hearted teacher nicknamed "Granny" deal with the stresses of prom dresses, college application fees and a lock-down caused by the search for a gun-wielding student. We follow the Urban League's lead neighborhood coordinator Pamela Bakewell on her community rounds as she tries to craft an identity apart from her better-known brother, Danny. The security team keeping peace outside the high school includes Nation of Islam members. The partnership overseeing Crenshaw High gets high and low marks, along with student performance. Longtime residents fight to keep from losing their homes in a wave of foreclosures. A leadership program gives an ex-con hope. With a jobless rate of 30 percent or more, demands are high for the Urban League's training centers. And, of course, no one likes the school cafeteria food.