How do you teach a student enamored with the performing arts fundamental science lessons like polarity and magnetism?

For Columbia Elementary School in Colorado Springs District 11, the answer is simple: put on a play.

“Watching kids run in attraction and bounce off each other for repulsion is a great way to demonstrate to everybody what magnetism is or isn’t, instead of ‘Did you get the question right or wrong on a worksheet?’” D-11 Superintendent Michael Gaal said.

In its ongoing effort to maximize success in all students, Colorado Springs D-11 is continuing the rollout of academic pathway schools to appeal to all types of learners.

Starting in the 2025-26 school year, Mann, West and Swigert middle schools will begin to plan out their incoming experiential learning; science, technology, engineering and math (STEM); and dual-language immersion pathways, respectively.

These middle schools will join Holmes, Jenkins, Sabin, Galileo and North, which are entering their second years with their pathways.

The different pathways determined by the district include STEM, visual and performing arts (VAPA), dual-language immersion, outdoor education, career and technical education, and the International Baccalaureate (IB) curriculum.

“Any time a child is active in their learning, they are more successful,” Gaal said. “Pathway schools give us an opportunity, in a controlled fashion, to find those passions and now we’re getting ready to morph them into middle schools.”  

What is a pathway school?

An expansion of the district’s academic master plan rolled out for the 2020-21 school year to meet the needs of a diverse array of district families, the new slate of middle schools represents the continuation of the district’s introduction of elementary pathways in recent years.

A pathway school refers to a school with specialized offerings and curriculum for all students in a school district to attend, if they’re interested. Unlike a magnet school, which can have stricter parameters for enrollment based on meritocracy or other factors, pathway schools are available to all students regardless of their location .

It also differs from a charter school because it is still held to the performance goals, policies and regulations enacted by the school district.  

Starting with Steele Elementary receiving an IB designation in 2023, the district developed its first pathway of schools for the college prep curriculum through high school. Students interested in seeking an IB diploma can now start at Steele and feed into North Middle School and then Palmer High School, which are both IB-designated.

Following a process over the past three years that included community feedback and curriculum planning, D-11 implemented new pathways into six of its elementary schools: Columbia and Martinez are now visual and performing arts integrated schools, Bristol and McAuliffe now specialize in STEM, Howbert is now an outdoor learning school and Martinez a dual-language school for English and Spanish.

All areas and subjects of instruction are complemented with their particular pathway. While still meeting educational standards set by the Colorado Department of Education, the schools’ teachers are then allowed to specialize their lesson plans in all subjects with the common area of interest.

At Columbia, a lesson in English Language Arts includes a tableau of a Roman council acted out by students to learn about Julius Caesar. Columbia’s principal, Stephanie Atencio, observed that these types of lessons – or scenes, if you will – are often continued by students in the cafeteria or on the playground during recess. 

“And that’s what’s really exciting to me, as an educator: to see that the kids are still engaged with their learning outside of the classroom,” she said.  

Conversely, Bristol Elementary is a school previously known for its arts focus with programs like its Suzuki violin classes, so teachers pushed to adopt a STEAM pathway. Now, with the greater focus on science and technology, teachers often pair a social studies lesson like famous explorers throughout history with supplemental information on their different ships, the engineering to build them and their utilization of compasses.

The specialized coursework also allows greater opportunities for experiential learning. Howbert often utilizes the abundance of opportunities for outdoor learning in the area while VAPA schools may take field trips to see the Colorado Springs Philharmonic or host professional musicians or artists to teach a lesson at the school.

“The standard doesn’t change. But how your child interacts with that standard to learn it, we’re finding that parents want a more niche experience that is complementary to either their student’s passion or their student’s known learning style,” Gaal said.  

The goal of expanding the pathways into middle schools was to continue the academic instruction and development of the specialized learners throughout their K-12 years. Middle schools’ pathways were partly determined by what elementary school feeds into them and the high school they feed into.

For example, in addition to Palmer’s IB pathway, Coronado High School’s strong robotics program made its feeder middle school West a suitable fit to focus on STEM education or Mitchell’s aviation pathway for McAullife and Sabin students.

The two other middle schools without a defined pathway, Jenkins and Holmes, have instead been designated as what the district is referring to as “Quality Neighborhood Schools.”

Nicole Ottmer, D-11’s chief of strategy and implementation, said the designation refers to “rich, broad” experiences provided at the school for deeper learning experiences, despite not being tied to a single area of focus.

Are the pathways making a difference?

The results inside and outside the classrooms have been positive, thus far.

In the case of Columbia and Martinez, both schools landed on the state’s watch list for school performance as “priority improvement” schools in 2022. Since then, the schools’ respective pathways have been implemented and both are now off the state’s watch list, with Martinez receiving the state’s highest rating as a “performance” school.

Other schools like Howbert and Bristol have maintained their respective “performance” ratings over this span of time, but the specialized instruction is now attracting new families who may not have been interested before. 

“I give weekly tours to families who are interested in the school and I’d say we’re about 50-50. Half of the parents are interested in our Suzuki violin program and half are interested in our STEM programs,” said Bristol Elementary Principal Gabe Hammel. “We’re about 60% choice. So, a lot of our families are coming in from areas outside our area.” 

Ottmer said that simple tweaks in reading assignments from a textbook to a script for a play can make the difference for some students developing their foundational reading skills, with one Columbia student showing two years of reading growth in six months.

Along with new training and lesson plans, the elementary schools have received greater investments in programming to support their respective pathways. Howbert Elementary now features a home garden and outdoor classroom while Martinez has a dance studio complete with mirrored walls. Each elementary pathway school now has a revamped logo to further showcase their unique offerings.  

Another result has been a new culture and identity for students, staff and even the neighborhood to embrace.

“We now have people walk up to our school who are excited and want to be a part of it by helping out teachers and participating in our art nights. They’ve really come out in droves,” Atencio said.

“I had one parent recently walk up to me and say the school has saved the neighborhood. He was very moved.”

Rather than continue implementing more pathways into existing schools, the plan for D-11 is to continue the development of the current pathway schools, but options remain for further expansion like potentially adding languages to its dual-language schools.

Beyond the rollout of the middle schools, Gaal said the plan is to ultimately implement job-embedded internships and apprenticeships aligned with these pathways in D-11’s high schools with options to earn college credits.

“That, to me, is the fulfillment of the pathway: that a kid says, ‘I did these things in elementary and middle school and now here’s my hyper-specific thing that happens in high school that’s just for me,’” he said.