Commentary
Monday’s Denver school board meeting offered an almost perfect microcosm of the board’s operational ineptitude over the past 16 months: struggling to get out of its own way, and then making terrible decisions when it finally does.
The recent proposal from DPS Superintendent Alex Marrero to revoke the district’s partnership with the Beacon Innovation Zone breaks my heart. It is deeply troubling to me that a leader like Alex Magaña, who is leading on equitable education, is being penalized for all of his hard work.
The current Denver Public Schools Board of Education has failed in its oversight responsibilities and has demonstrated an inability to lead and manage effectively. We are among a group of DPS parents that has banded together and launched a petition drive to demand that all seven members resign immediately.
As Wednesday’s shooting of two administrators at East High School demonstrates in the starkest possible terms, the decision by the Denver Board of Education to remove school resource officers from high schools in 2021 was a grave mistake, and one with tragic consequences. Not surprisingly, no one involved is acknowledging this, at least not publicly.
Why does DPS want to put an end to an organization that is showing promise? Power and control seem to be the answer.
The school board might close three severely under-enrolled schools, and members are getting along, but they continue a drive toward less transparency.
The DPS board and leadership seem more interested in imposing their will and reining in innovative practices than in focusing on what we at Beacon Network Schools are doing to serve our students.
The simple, straightforward Denver Public Schools Debt Clock website, debuting today, serves as a stark reminder that postponing important decisions for political reasons can be costly -– literally as well as figuratively.
With Denver Public Schools innovation plan renewals coming up for votes over the next few months, we’ll be able to see in real time just how badly the school board has, with its meddling, damaged the concept of innovation.
Students, namely Black boys, are significantly more likely to graduate high school and enroll in college if they have a Black man as a teacher in elementary school. Black boys improve standardized test scores when they have Black men as teachers. Simply put, Black boys – and students more broadly – benefit from having Black men in the classroom.
Judge cites DPS’ “shocking disregard” for school safety in East shootings. It remains a cause for concern today
The potentially deadly ineptitude of Denver Public Schools’ approach to safety under the current regime is laid bare in a searing ruling issued this week by a federal judge in the lawsuit of an East High School dean shot inside the school by a student three years ago.