Denver Public School Superintendent Alex Marrero seems to have a strong dislike for the Luminary Learning Network, Denver’s only remaining innovation zone of schools.
During a school board work session April 15, Marrero attempted to explain his opposition to allowing Willow Elementary School in Central Park to join the LLN, which currently holds seven schools. But the word-salad that emerged left me, and I suspect others, scratching their heads.
At various times during the meeting, Marrero offered a few reasons for his opposition to expanding LLN. Adding Willow would “allow certain parts of our community to self-segregate,” in violation of board policies (or executive imitations in policy governance jargon); would not improve Willow’s already impressive performance and might hurt it; and that LLN has possibly engaged in some unspecified, shady dealings with money to induce schools to join or stay in the zone.
Before we examine Marrero’s flabby arguments, a brief primer on innovation zones. As codified in Colorado’s Innovation Schools Act of 2008, innovation offers district-run schools some measure of autonomy over how schools are run, providing an opportunity to waive out of certain district and state policies and creating school or zone-customized policies in their place. The innovation plan containing those policies must be approved by at least 60 percent of a school’s staff.
LLN has an extra layer of distancing from the district. It is its own non-profit organization, run by an independent board and led by Executive Director Bailey Holyfield.
And there’s the rub. Marrero clearly wants to consolidate as many as schools as possible under his control, returning to the bad old days of large urban districts being run by a bloated, inefficient system. LLN is a big thorn in his side for that reason.
Charter schools are here to stay. LLN presents a tempting, isolated target.
Now, back to Marrero’s arguments against Willow joining the zone.
The segregation issue is arguably the most important because it appears to have swayed at least one board member (Monica Hunter), and perhaps others. But it’s specious at best.
Marrero argued that Willow specifically and LLN as a whole has a lower percentage of students of color than the district as a whole. LLN is 58.2 percent students of color and Willow is 58.3 percent students of color, while DPS as a whole is about 76 percent students of color.
But wait a minute: A school or zone that is more than half students of color is not segregated. In fact, it’s the very definition of integrated. Allowing a school that mirrors the zone’s very diverse demographics to join does not somehow prop up a “deeply rooted system of oppression,” which DPS has pledged to dismantle. But that’s what Marrero said this would mean.
And if Marrero persists in hammering at this point, perhaps he should consider that his own networks of elementary schools look much like LLN demographically. The district divides its schools into networks, or zones for supervisory purposes. Elementary Network 2 is about 57 percent students of color, Elementary Network 4 is about 59 percent,, and Elementary Network 1 and the Middle School Network are in the mid-60s.
The district elementary networks are not purely geographic, but for the most part Network 2 is in the east/southeast, Network 4 is central, and Network 1 is primarily northwest.,
If you want to tackle systems of oppression and segregation, how about getting on with the work of changing attendance boundaries so you don’t have schools that are close to 100 percent kids of color, and other schools where between two-thirds and three-quarters of the students are white (Cory, Steele, Slavens, Bromwell), in a district that consists of just 25 percent white students?
I’ll stand and cheer if the board and administration muster the courage to handle that hot potato.
Beating up on LLN for being a self-segregating entity is laughable on its face when contextualize Marrero’s lame argument.
Marrero’s other self-segregation point is that LLN is in effect swapping Ashley Elementary School, which has more than 90 percent students of color, for Willow. Ashley decided last year to leave LLN after years of poor academic performance. The decision was mutually agreed upon by the school, the district and LLN.
Yet in his remarks, Marrero framed the decision as “the abandonment of Ashley” by LLN. And board member Hunter, who was not on the board at the time, said “Ashley was treated very poorly,” and said its exit was part of LLN’s effort to “self segregate and become almost a block of private, privileged, affluent schools.”
The other arguments Marrero made ranged from sloppy to flat-out bizarre. Whether Willow will improve if it joins LLN is actually moot. It met all the criteria for joining, including a vote of a super-majority of the faculty to become part of the zone. Clearly, the school’s educators believe that the autonomies, tailored professional development, and tight community of schools will provide significant benefits.
And on the bizarre side, Marrero hinted at shady financial dealings from mysterious sources that benefitted LLN and its schools. He offered no evidence and in fact said he had none.
There is a Professional Services Agreement that governs the financial relationship between the schools, the zone, and the district. At no point has DPS ever notified LLN of using funds in a way that violates the terms of that agreement.
When the board votes on allowing Willow into LLN later this month, let’s hope that reason prevails and that at least four members will see through the smoke and recognize that Marrero continues to consolidate power and eliminate autonomy, moves that have nothing to do with improving the learning of the district’s students.
