Jan. 31, 2025

We hope that your 2025 school year is off to a great start. As always, we are grateful for everyone’s hard work and dedication to our students and families in DPS. We know that this makes a difference in the education of our students. Thank you for choosing DPS!

In this edition, we cover many topics and encourage you to send us feedback on this edition and let us know what you’d like to see in future editions. Send your comments to Board@dpsk12.net.

As part of our Governance Policy 15, the Board is working on having a stronger presence in the community. Over the next few months, board members will engage with the community within their respective districts with the at-large members attending various district meetings. RSVP links will be posted on the Board website.

• Vice President De la Rosa, District 5: CEC Early College, Feb. 11, 6-8 p.m.

• Director Sia, District 1: Merrill Middle School, Feb. 26, 6-8 p.m.

• President Dr. Olson, District 3: George Washington High School, March 11, 6-8 p.m.

• Director Gaytán, District 2: Lincoln High School, March 13, 6-8 p.m.

• Director Quattlebaum, District 4: McAuliffe International, March 4, 6-8 p.m.

Director Esserman and Mr. Youngquist, who serve as the Board’s at-large members, will attend various district engagements.

As a reminder, members of the community are always welcome to sign up for public comment each month by following these instructions.

The Board of Education’s BoardDocs platform is being upgraded to Diligent Community. This new platform will improve the end-user experience and make it easier for staff, students and community members to access important documents. Diligent Community will go live on March 1.

Earlier this week, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as The Nation’s Report Card, released their 2024 NAEP Mathematics and Reading results, providing insights into state and national student achievement. Denver Public Schools is proud to report steady NAEP performance across all four tested areas, with greater gains in fourth-grade reading and mathematics than the state of Colorado.

According to NAEP, DPS remains one of the top performers among the 27 districts who participated in the 2024 Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA), which focuses on trends in urban education. The district achieved the second highest average eighth-grade reading scores and the sixth highest average fourth-grade reading scores amongst TUDA districts. DPS joined the group of urban districts participating in TUDA in 2017.

“The district’s strong performance on NAEP is a testament to the board, administration, and staff remaining steadfast in the pursuit of their goals for improving outcomes for all students in the district,” said Dr. Ray Hart, Executive Director of the Council of the Great City Schools.

The district showed increases from 2022 in both fourth- and eighth-grade reading, compared to statistically significant decreases in public schools nationally. Denver's mean scale score increased nominally but with greater magnitude than the national public or Colorado schools. Notably, the district's 2024 scores in three out of four tested areas are not significantly different from the 2019 pre-pandemic performance levels, compared to the national public schools report of significant decreases across all four assessments.

"The gains we've seen reflect the commitment of our entire community to educational excellence,” said Superintendent Dr. Alex Marrero. “We must continue to push forward, ensuring that even more of our students are equipped and on track for long-term academic success. Every step we take is a step closer to achieving the high standards we’ve set for all of our learners."

The past few weeks have brought a steady stream of new challenges to Denver Public Schools. While there is great uncertainty for our community, I want to reassure everyone that the Board of Education will continue to stand by our values and support all students and staff members.

With the City of Denver and DPS embracing new-to-country families, there have been a number of high-profile stories in the local and national media that have not always accurately reflected the actual facts of how DPS has responded. Below you will find a series of questions and answers that clarifies what actions DPS is taking.

There have been a number of Executive Orders and policy changes regarding Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion as well as the rights of our LGBTQ+ community. How has DPS responded?
While the “Defending Women” Executive Order asserts the Trump Administration’s position that, “As the policy of the United States,” only ‘two sexes’ will be recognized,” DPS remains committed to following all applicable state and federal laws, which remain in place. This provides ongoing recognition of and protection from harassment and discrimination on the basis of LGBTQ+ status. This one-pager does not cover every applicable law, but highlights key state laws.

The U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights opened an investigation into an all-gender lavatory recently added at East High School. What will DPS do?
The all-gender bathroom was added as the result of a student-led process that reflects our commitment to inclusivity, student voice, leadership and empowerment, and ultimately provides a welcoming space for all. The gender neutral lavatory has stalls that are designed for privacy, with 12-foot-tall partitions to ensure the comfort and security of all students who elect to use them. This restroom serves all students, including those who may feel uncomfortable in gender-specific facilities, and aligns with our value of putting students first. The faculty of East High School has developed a plan to supervise and monitor this lavatory, just as they do with all others. Currently, East High School has designated restrooms for male and female students in addition to the gender neutral lavatory. 

The creation of the all gender lavatory at East also aligns with a Board of Education resolution from 2020 calling for each school in the district to have at least one all-gender restroom.

It is unprecedented for the Office for Civil Rights to admittedly initiate its own investigation, especially into a single bathroom, as a result of local media coverage rather than in response to a filed complaint requesting their involvement. DPS will fully cooperate with the investigation. 

The Board of Education remains committed to our values and we will continue to honor the needs of our students and staff.

Is DPS instructing employees to obstruct government officials from entering our schools? 
There have been a number of media outlets who have falsely reported that DPS is directing employees to obstruct government officials. This is incorrect. These stories are a gross misrepresentation of the official policies and procedures of DPS. Protocol DPS recently shared with schools states that, “Although staff are expected to operate in accordance with these policies, staff will not physically impede, interfere with or obstruct a government official in performing their duties.”

Reminder of Current DPS Policies and Procedures
Over the course of the last few weeks, DPS staff members across the district have received training (pre-recordings are also available in English and Spanish) grounded in the existing DPS policies listed below.

• Based upon current DPS Administrative Policy KI, to ensure that no unauthorized persons enter buildings with wrongful intent, all school visitors shall report to the school office when entering and receive authorization before visiting elsewhere in the building. No individual should be permitted to enter the building without ascertaining whether the individual has a legitimate business or educational purpose.

• Per DPS Administrative Policy JIH (Student Interviews, Interrogations, Searches and Arrest), federal immigration law enforcement activities would not be permitted at our schools, on transportation routes, on DPS property or during school activities without a valid search warrant or exigent circumstances.

• Under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), we are required to limit who has access to student documents. In addition, DPS does not collect the immigration status of our families in alignment with DPS Administrative Policy JRA/JRC-R.

DPS will continue to follow the law and provide an education to all students regardless of their immigration status. We will also continue to protect the personal information of all of our students and staff and will not share it unless required by law. Additionally, the district will cooperate with local law enforcement to the extent required by law in regards to federal demands and policing.

Our incredible DPS team has also created a toolkit with immigration resources for families that is available in English and Spanish, and contains information and resources about rights, current DPS policies, training, mental health support, DPS resources and community partner resources. The Safe and Welcoming webpage also contains information from the toolkits such as current DPS policies, resources and an FAQ. DPS will continue to work with city agencies and community organizations to provide additional resources via the toolkits and webpage.

I want to thank Dr. Marrero and the entire DPS team, especially educators and leaders in schools, for their continued support of our students. While this is a challenging time, the Board of Education will remain focused on ensuring all students have access to a high quality education and schools that remain safe, welcoming, inclusive and supportive.

Welcome to the Policy Governance Corner. Information shared in this section will focus on helping the Denver community understand Policy Governance and how it affects the district. A new topic will be covered each month to expand on previous issues.

Reasonable interpretations are one of the ten guiding principles of the Policy Governance Model. If you watched the Dec. 19 school board meeting, you witnessed the Superintendent and his team present the 2024-25 RIs to the Board of Education. You might have wondered: What are RIs and how are they created? 

In the first edition of the Policy Governance Corner, we explained that the Board creates the vision and goals of the district through Ends policies. The Board also creates guardrails, in the form of Executive Limitation (EL) policies, that restrict how the Superintendent accomplishes the vision and goals of the Ends policies.

Each school year, the Superintendent and his team review the Ends and EL policies to create RIs for each policy. These RIs consist of the Superintendent’s interpretation of the policy, definitions of terms in the policy, measures, metrics, justification for the measures and metrics, targets, and time periods that the Board will receive monitoring reports showing whether the targets were accomplished.

The Superintendent may use any reasonable interpretation of the policies -- hence the term “reasonable interpretations.” The RIs are not required to adhere to RIs that a specific board member would have chosen or that a particular board member requests. Nor are the RIs required to be interpretations that community members would agree with or would implement themselves. The Superintendent is free to use his skills, talent, knowledge, education, and abilities to decide on the best RIs for the district. In October of each year, the Board evaluates the Superintendent’s performance by assessing whether or not the Superintendent accomplished the targets as outlined in the RIs.