Commentary

Our moment is now, because too many days have passed, and none are promised. Now is the only moment that we have. Now is the only answer to our question of when!

Given the agonizing budget decisions the Denver school board will have to make in the next couple of months, and given the influence the loudest voices crying ‘liar!’ have over some board members, it’s vitally important that everyone involved come to the table equipped with accurate, reliable information.

DPS is still struggling to define equity. Still struggling to define a shared vision forward with a comprehensive strategic plan to get there together. Too many departments, committees, sub-committees, and parts operating in silos, disconnected from the reality that we must align our brilliance to do what is better and best for black children and therefore all children served by Denver Public Schools.

The Reimagining SPF Committee is making it harder for members of the public to get critical academic data that they rely on to understand what is happening inside our schools. Committee members are asking you to trust that the system is working for the success of your student and then hiding the evidence that would prove it.

The Covid-19 calamity presents an opportunity for all sides to come together to create a new vision for what public education might look like in Denver when we emerge from the pandemic. We offer a respectful counterpoint to some recently floated ideas.

The structure and systems remain in place. Supremacy ideology continues to choke the potential of this district to be anything but talk when it comes to transforming the lived realities of black children, families, communities, teachers and leaders.

Two educator-moms are leading Denver Public Schools through the COVID-19 crisis. They help us remember something we too often forget: Parents deserve a major voice in their children's education.

I must stop obsessing about poor families being on a predictable path to economic exile, and remember that the white middle-class college-educated people working public school jobs with full benefits are the real victims of the system.

What is remarkable is that Jeannie Kaplan can pen a 2,000-word screed and offer not a single affirmative idea about how to improve Denver Public Schools.