Author: Yesenia Robles Chalkbeat Colorado

Five candidates have qualified to run for three open seats on the Aurora school board, at a time when the district is in the midst of a leadership change and is grappling with low state ratings. Only one of the five candidates is an incumbent, Vickie Reinhard. Two other board members, Stephanie Mason and Nichelle…

When Centennial Elementary in Greeley was facing state intervention in 2016, Superintendent Deirdre Pilch, who was new at the time, decided to try something different. She surprised then-Principal Anthony Asmus by letting him decide how he wanted to turn things around at the school. “She backed us up,” recalled Asmus. “We had the choice for…

The State Board of Education voted 5-3 Thursday to deny an appeal from a charter school seeking to open a new high school in Adams 14. The Adams 14 school board had denied the application from Be the Change Community School for a high school with biliteracy and project-based learning in November. This was the…

As more employers across Colorado require workers to be vaccinated against COVID, school districts seem to be in no hurry to mandate vaccines for teachers and other staff. One local district, the Aurora Public Schools, announced as far back as May that it planned to require the vaccine for employees as soon as it received…

When Jennifer Velez was unhappy with her kids’ schools, she didn’t know that in Colorado she could take them across district boundaries. Then, a friend who was coaching her son’s youth football team said he was moving his son to Mapleton. If she sent her son, too, the kids would at least have each other…

When Jeffco leaders saved four out of five schools from closure in 2017, they knew they were just kicking the problem down the road. They said so at the time. They even paid an education consulting firm $170,000 to look at how other districts handle school closures and make recommendations, but the report was shelved…

To give schools room to experiment, the State Board of Education passed new rules this summer that give Colorado districts full funding this year and next for students enrolled in any type of online program. In exchange, districts must share data showing that those students are actually learning.  Members of the State Board acknowledge they’re…

The Aurora school board will now have more say about some district decisions.  A board vote Tuesday requires Superintendent Rico Munn to communicate with the board and consider its input 60 days before asking for a vote on certain issues. The new rule will apply to decisions about the budget, school closures or boundary changes,…