News - West Denver Preparatory Charter School

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE.

WHAT: WEST DENVER PREP’S 7th GRADE CSAP SCORES 1st AMONG SCHOOLS OF SIMILAR POPULATION
WHEN: July, 2008
CONTACT: Contact Chris Gibbons, Head of School, at 303-573-2017 x307.

WEST DENVER PREP’S 7th GRADE CSAP SCORES 1st AMONG SCHOOLS OF SIMILAR POPULATION

On the 2008 CSAP tests in 7th grade, West Denver Prep students were ranked first in all subject area proficiency among open enrollment Denver schools serving a similar population.

West Denver Prep’s 7th grade math CSAP scores ranked second among all Denver schools regardless of student population. 72% scored proficient or advanced, exceeding the state average by 26% and exceeding the average proficiency in such suburban districts as Cherry Creek and Douglas County.

West Denver Prep’s 7th grade students exceeded DPS average CSAP proficiency by 45% in math, 26% in writing, and 16% in reading. 6th grade students also exceeded the district proficiency average, by 21% in math, 11% in reading, and 6% in writing. These scores represented an average increase in proficiency of 25% over these same students’ scores last year in 5th grade.

West Denver Preparatory Charter School is a college-preparatory public charter middle school. In the most recent year, 189 students applied for about 140 spots. As a public charter school, West Denver Prep is open to all students and selects them by lottery, with no review of grades, test scores, or past academic experience. West Denver Prep is currently preparing to open a second middle school campus in the fall of 2009.

Charter-school fans want more
By Jeremy P. Meyer
The Denver Post
May 17, 2008

A group of angry parents stood before the Denver school board last month, holding up newspaper articles about a high-performing charter school and asking why their children were unable to receive the same education.

"We want this for our kids and our families," said Luci Saenz, mother of a child at Valdez Elementary. "We are ready to fight. We believe in our children, and we believe they deserve it."

Like other urban districts, Denver Public Schools has had trouble educating the city's poorest students. But two charter middle schools on the city's west side have proved it can be done.

The success of KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy and West Denver Preparatory Charter School is spurring a charter renaissance. At least a dozen charter schools are being planned for the city over the next decade based on high-performing models.

At the same time, a group of charter advocates is joining forces with plans to add dozens more schools to teach low-income urban youth on Colorado's Front Range.

"You are going to see more and more of this — more schools are going to get created and more communities demanding them," said Tony Lewis, director of the Donnell-Kay Foundation. "I don't think this is an aberration. This is a new trend."

• Denver School of Science & Technology, which is sending its entire senior class to colleges next year, recently broke ground on a new middle school in northeast Denver.

• West Denver Prep wants to add three more schools and serve a total of 1,000 students from sixth to 12th grade by 2015. It is already adding to its current facility.

• KIPP Sunshine Peak, another high-performing charter school, wants four new schools: two elementary schools, one middle school and a high school. It is seeking buildings and leaders and hopes to serve 2,400 kids on five campuses.

• Global Prep, based on the successful Envision Schools in San Francisco, is planning a sixth- through 12th-grade school for students

Jonathan Carda-Cerate, 12, fills in a chart for a math class at West Denver Preparatory Charter School, the best middle school in Denver by a new districtwide gauge. At the school, students study math for nearly two hours a day, the school day is longer, homework must be done and youths are surrounded with reminders to keep a focus on college. (Andy Cross, The Denver Post )

from families whose members have never been to college. The school could be the first of six in Denver.

"People are so starved for high-performing new schools," said Lewis, whose organization is behind the creation of the Global Prep school and who has been meeting with others about forming a group to help create more schools.

A similar organization in Chicago, The Renaissance Schools Fund, is an independent nonprofit working with Chicago Public Schools to create 100 schools in underserved parts of the city by 2010.

Lewis and others are in Chicago this week to discuss the concept.

On Thursday, officials from Chicago schools will meet with Denver school board members and the public to discuss their city's new schools program and how charter schools share facilities with other schools.

DPS invites outside-the-box ideas

It's unclear whether increasing the number of charter schools in Denver will dilute their success. Critics of charters argue schools are successful because they cater to parents who are already engaged.

Yet, DPS understands there is a need for new school programs and this year sought proposals from groups inside and outside the district to develop new schools.

They got 19 proposals — eight were charter schools, and eight were "innovation schools," a school program with greater flexibility but staffed by district employees.

"We are looking for strong new district schools and strong new charters," said Tom Boasberg, DPS operations officer. "We're very pleased to see so many strong applicants."

Last month, the parents who stood before the school board had a model in mind.

They had visited West Denver Prep in southwest Denver and were intoxicated by what they saw.

The 2-year-old school for sixth- and seventh-graders is the best middle school in Denver, based on DPS' new assessment tool that tracks student growth.

Not far behind is KIPP Sunshine Peak — a school for fifth- through eighth-graders that also serves mostly low-income Latino students on the city's west side.

"We would love to have that for our children," parent Luci Saenz told the school board.

Kids work hard, with college in mind

West Denver Prep, in one of the city's poorest neighborhoods, uses a program designed by its 29-year-old Yale-educated leader, Chris Gibbons.

Gibbons studied successful charter schools around the country and built a program that uses rewards, continual assessments, strict discipline and rigorous academics.

Students every day get 110 minutes of math, 150 minutes of literacy, and one 50-minute period each of history and science. The school tests often, employs interventions early and keeps parents informed about their children's progress and behavior.

About two-thirds of students enter into the school at least one grade behind. Students and parents sign a contract at the beginning of the year agreeing, among other things, that students will not advance to the next grade unless they prove to be proficient.

The school's 196 students arrive by 8 a.m. and leave by 4:15, unless they've failed to do homework, which means they must stay another hour.

Throughout the day they receive messages about going to college.

Classrooms are named after teachers' colleges, entry-way posters proclaim sixth-graders as the "College Class of 2018" and students cap the morning all-school meeting with a chant — "I am here to strive for college."

"If a kid doesn't leave the eighth grade with a sense of college and being on track, it's going to be way difficult," Gibbons said.

The school opened in August 2006 in an old nursing home and next year will add an eighth grade. Plans call for a new middle school and a new high school.

"These charter schools are finally making this second leap," said Alex Ooms, president of the school's board. "You're getting this second wave of really good charters separating themselves from the pack."

More time in school "all pays off"

A few miles away, at KIPP Sunshine Peak, director Richard Barrett likes to take visitors into the boys' bathroom and ask what they see.

White fixtures, white stalls and white paint are spotless with no trace of graffiti.

Barrett says the bathroom reflects respect.

"We bring kids into this bathroom and say, 'This is your mama's bathroom; don't mess it up,' " he said.

Barrett also walks visitors outside to show them the grounds that he says reveals a lack of respect for his program.

The school has a waiting list of 250 kids. But it is sandwiched between two DPS schools and unable to expand.

Half of the students are taught in 14 portables, and the school uses tennis courts for outside physical education.

Next door, Rishel Middle School, which serves a similar demographic, was at 58 percent capacity in 2006, according to DPS records.

"We're too cramped," Barrett said. "We would like a building that could suit all of needs. Shared use and shared space is our goal."

Students have three hours of homework every night, they begin school at 7:25 and end at 5 p.m., they have three weeks of summer school and 18 days of Saturday school.

They also get cross-country field trips during the spring.

"It all pays off," said Aurora LaMarine, 13, who got a full ride next year to Middlesex School in Concord, Mass., a private boarding school.

"We have 60 eighth-graders, and every one has been accepted into a quality four-year pre-college program," Barrett said.

"That's our standard. . . . Our goal is to revitalize the community through the schools and make it a safer community for all individuals, not just a select few."

Jeremy P. Meyer: 303-954-1367 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com

Kids anxious to attend charter
By Joey Bunch
The Denver Post
February 13, 2008

Magdalena Tapia cries after daughter Magda Figueroa Sugey was selected for a place at West Denver Prep.

Rosa and Lindsay Gomez sat on the front row at West Denver Prep on Tuesday night, clutching each other and fidgeting in unison as though their lives depended on the enrollment lottery.

Finally, deep in the drawing of 150 future sixth-graders from 189 families, Lindsay's name was called and worried grimaces turned to relieved sighs and ebullient smiles.

"It's a really good school," said the beaming 10-year-old, who wants to be a lawyer.

"It's the best," her mother added.

A room full of loving parents wanted the best for their kids. They wanted them to attend a charter school that has taken students from the poorest region of the city and turned them into academic stars, with no excuses and one goal: college.

Rosa Gomez and daughter Lindsay, 10, watch as the names of 150 future sixth-graders are drawn. (Photos by John Leyba, The Denver Post )

Parents of current and future students said the modest building at South Federal Boulevard and West Jewell Avenue recruits passionate, dedicated teachers, allows them to help draft the curriculum, then puts its passion behind teaching rather than riding herd on behavior

Darren Rivera, 11, got in last fall. At his old school he was constantly treated as failure, he said. His mother, Tommy Rivera, said she felt like a failure as a mother because her son couldn't learn as fast as others.

"I didn't get much help," Darren said. "They didn't even really offer help when I asked for it."

But that all turned around this year.

"He feels a sense of success, and it helps make him successful," Tommy Rivera said. "At other schools, teachers don't have the time or resources."

And that's the academic success Magda Figueroa Sugey, 10, is looking for on her way to becoming a doctor.

The tiny girl in the pink outfit grabbed her mother and squeezed so tight that her mother gasped when Magda's name was called. Magda seized her mother's cellphone and raced outside to call her father at work.

Her mother, Magdalena, speaks no English, but her tears said volumes.

Chris Gibbons, the head of school at West Denver Prep, watched the joy children exhibited when they were chosen.

"Kids don't get enough credit for understanding their future," he said. "They know this matters."

He also kept watch on parent Sabrina Gutierrez, as she become more agitated and tearful as the lottery wound down.

"If her child doesn't get in, it's going to be bad," he whispered.

But when Briann Gutierrez was chosen, her mother called out loudly, "Praise the Lord," and raised her hand to heaven as her tears began to flow.

"All parents want the best education for their children," she said. "And this is the best."

Joey Bunch: 303-954-1174 or jbunch@denverpost.com

'DiDN'T REALLY KNOW HOW GOOD I COULD BE' BY NANCY MITCHELL, ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS

Bridget Newman grades student papers during her more than two-hour bus ride from West Denver Preparatory Charter School on South Federal Boulevard to her home in Boulder. Frustrated after her first teaching job in New Jersey, she says this job made her realize she wanted to stay in teaching.

MONDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2007
IN HER OWN WORDS: BRIDGET NEWMAN

Bridget Newman, 25, began teaching this fall at West Denver Preparatory Charter School, a college prep middle school on South Federal Boulevard. It's her second job in teaching. She taught for two years in a traditional public middle school in Camden, N.J., not long after the city was named the most dangerous in America. Her experience there nearly turned her off teaching. West Denver Prep changed that. She spends more than two hours a day on the bus, commuting from her Boulder home to the school. Here's why she believes it's worth it:

"At my former school, I didn't feel like student achievement was the focus of the school. It might have been about keeping jobs for people, it might have been about what was easiest for teachers, what was easiest for administrators. But it wasn't about the students.

"I saw a lot of students fall through the cracks, and I saw a lot of students that a lot of teachers had basically written off, and I just couldn't deal with that anymore. I wanted to be at a school where there was a commitment to all of the students.

"(Right away here) I just felt so at home and I was just so relieved to be in a place where it was, 'This is how we make sure every student achieves,' and 'This is the extra tutoring that we give students,' and 'This is the kind of structure we have in our classroom.'

"What was really refreshing to me as a teacher was to hear, if there's a student that you have already given a consequence in your classroom and they're still disrupting your teaching, you send them out. At my former school, you could send a kid out, say for even getting into a fight with another student, and they could be back in three minutes.

"The expectations of teachers are definitely higher here. But I've really liked that.

"Before I came here, I didn't really know how good I could be. If it's enough to come in at 8:30, leave at 3:30, and if your kids are quiet, and that's the main expectation, you don't really know everything you can do. . . .

"Here, we're actually treated as professionals, professionals who can design their own curriculum, professionals who went to college and know a lot about their subject matter.

"At my old school it was very common to have the entire school, say 100 teachers together in the library, and a PowerPoint presentation about how you should do things. The language would be, 'OK folks, we have to raise test scores' or 'Some folks aren't coming to work every day; well, you have to come to work every day.' It just felt not inspiring.

"I really like being on call at night. It is a little bit of extra time, but I'm not getting 20 homework calls a night. I maybe get two or three, and I think it's really good that kids know they have that lifeline.

"Sometimes I am tired. I get up at 5 o'clock in the morning to get a 6:10 bus that leaves for Denver, and then I take another bus to come here. But I think . . . I must really like doing this because I can't think of anything else that I would even want to get up at 5 o'clock in the morning and go do.

"When I was teaching in Camden, I was about 99 percent sure that as soon as I was finished teaching, I wanted to go to grad school.

"But once I visited this school, I realized that I really did want to stay in teaching. I actually ended up turning down several grad school offers. . . .

"I don't think there's anything more important or anything that fits my skills and interests better than helping to make sure all kids have opportunities."

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

WHAT: WEST DENVER PREP ONE OF TWO DPS MIDDLE SCHOOLS WITH “SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENT” RATING
WHEN: December 5, 2007
CONTACT: Contact Chris Gibbons, Head of School, at 303-573-2017 x307. www.westdenverprep.org

IN ITS FIRST YEAR, CHARTER SCHOOL RECEIVES “AVERAGE” RATING WITH STUDENTS SHOWING “SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENT”

West Denver Preparatory Charter School, in it first year of operations, was one of only 2 DPS middle schools (among 45 total) to receive the designation of “Significant Improvement” in the academic growth of its students, according to the School Accountability Reports released today by the Colorado Department of Education.

West Denver Prep received an “Average” rating in its first year, generally recognized as a considerable achievement. Among schools composed of more than two-thirds students who qualify for Federal Free or Reduced Lunch, the district average, only 4 middle schools received a rating of Average or better.

“This represents a significant first step that our students are taking toward a future of college success,” remarked Head of School Chris Gibbons.

West Denver Preparatory Charter School is a college-preparatory public charter middle school. When the school first opened in 2006, one hundred and thirty-seven Southwest Denver families applied for the one hundred spots in West Denver Prep, following a door-to-door campaign reaching approximately 800 families. In the most recent year, 181 students applied for about 100 spots. As a public charter school, West Denver Prep is open to all students, and selects them by lottery, with no review of grades, test scores, or past academic experience.

Fully 66% of West Denver Prep’s sixth graders scored proficient or advanced in math, exceeding the district average by 26%. Students also exceeded the district proficiency average by 13% in writing and 5% in reading. These scores represent longitudinal progress of between 8-29% increased proficiency as compared to these same students’ 5th grade scores.

Gibbons: Education inequity 'appalling'

gibbons

Javier Manzano © News

Chris Gibbons, head of school at West Denver Preparatory Charter School, sits among students after a weekly community meeting. He returned to Colorado after graduating from Yale University and has worked in west Denver off and on for 10 years.

By Nancy Mitchell, Rocky Mountain News
September 17, 2007

Chris Gibbons, 29, attended private schools growing up in Littleton and Denver before graduating from Yale University with a degree in biology. He came back to Denver to run a program called Denver Summerbridge, a tutoring program for low-income kids that sparked his interest in teaching. Two falls ago, he opened West Denver Prep, a school that embraces uniforms, nightly homework and a culture of high expectations. State test results show the school outperformed district averages in its first year. So why is someone with a middle-class background and an Ivy League degree running a school serving mostly Hispanic, mostly poor children on Denver's west side?

"I really believe education is the biggest social justice issue facing our country right now. I think the inequity of the education gap across race and class lines is both really significant and really appalling.

I feel grateful I got a great education. I really believe in public education. Knowing how much that education had an impact on me makes me passionate about everyone, regardless of color and income, having access to those opportunities.

I think the privileges and opportunities I have had carry a certain responsibility . . . the 'To whom much is given, much is required' sort of thing.

The structure, 'warm strict,' is the best way to get kids prepared for high levels of academic performance in a short period of time. It's similar to the idea of tough love. When I was out recruiting teachers for Summerbridge, I would ask, 'Do you love kids enough to hold them accountable?'

I don't believe the school is for every kid. That said, I think the increased structure creates opportunities for freedom and creativity. Once safety is in place, a lot of other things can happen. And I think it's in line with what parents want.

I have always had an affinity for Latino culture, from learning the language and from traveling to South America in college. I have always found a cultural value around warmth and inclusion and hospitality. I really enjoy in the Latino culture. Our first Summerbridge schools were in west Denver, so I've been working in this neighborhood off and on for the past 10 years.

I love my job. I love coming to work every day. I've never had a day here where I didn't feel like I'm really, really lucky to be here and excited to be doing this kind of work.

Raising the bar, raising success in schools

student

Javier Manzano © News

By Nancy Mitchell, Rocky Mountain News
September 17, 2007

On Thursday, the word of the day for the 200 students who attend West Denver Preparatory Charter School was urgent.

"Your education is urgent, your future is urgent," head of school Chris Gibbons told the uniform-clad students circled around him in the school's daily morning meeting.

"Go into class urgently," he said, and then almost offhandedly, "Why are you here?"

"I am here to strive for college," the sixth- and seventh-graders recited in unison.

Then they turned and marched out quickly, single file, silently, past the day's visitors - the admissions counselor of a prestigious private school and the head of a charter school across town - who have come to see how this fledging school works.

In a single year, in a former nursing home on the busy stretch of South Federal Boulevard that runs through the impoverished Westwood neighborhood, Gibbons and his staff have created a school that succeeds where others have failed.

They knocked on doors and recruited families. Today, West Denver Prep has a waiting list in a part of the city where neighborhood schools were losing students.

Gibbons and his staff asked children ages 10 and 11 to wear uniforms, to do homework every night, to come to school earlier and stay later, to not cuss or talk back or fight - and, for the most part, the kids complied.

They took sixth-graders from neighborhood elementaries who were, on average, two years below grade level and accelerated their skills, on average, three years in math, two years in writing and 1 1/2 years in reading.

West Denver Prep opened its doors in fall 2006 and, in its first round of state tests the following spring, outperformed district averages in reading, writing and math.

Yet not a single principal from a DPS neighborhood school has come to visit West Denver Prep or, for that matter, the nearby KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy, a charter school serving a similarly high-poverty population with similarly successful results.

Richard Barrett, who runs KIPP Sunshine Peak and who is both more experienced and opinionated than Gibbons, shakes his head when asked about the lack of interest.

"The biggest things we do you can do in every school," he said. "Our job would be so much easier if every school did this. Because then it would be the norm."

Turns out, lawyers - and DPS Superintendent Michael Bennet - agree with Barrett. Much of what is happening at his school, and at West Denver Prep, could happen in DPS neighborhood schools.

Want to limit enrollment to a certain number of kids? Manual High School did it this year, allowing a maximum of 180 ninth-graders to enroll.

Want to raise the bar higher than DPS policy? Try it. Bruce Randolph 6-12 School is doing it, deviating from a district policy that requires parental approval to hold kids back a grade.

"The legal advice is, as long as we're providing opportunities for all school-aged children in the city and county of Denver, there are no legal prohibitions on schools being able to establish sets of expectations with kids," Bennet said.

In other words, any Denver school can take a tough academic stance, such as requiring kids to do two hours of homework every night, as long as a student unable or unwilling to accept the work can attend another school in DPS.

"Schools can effect policies that set admissions criteria or requirements like Saturday school or other things," he said, "but the district needs to make sure it is providing education to kids who, for whatever reason, aren't served by places like that."

Bennet and his senior academic adviser, Brad Jupp, say DPS schools may be reluctant to set admissions criteria or otherwise raise the bar for all the right reasons.

Namely, the long-held value that public schools should serve every child who walks in their doors.

That argument falls flat with Gibbons and Barrett, who contend there's little equitable about a system of schools where minority and poor children trail their Anglo and affluent classmates in every subject tested.

Consider that 75 percent of Anglo seventh-graders in DPS were reading at grade level in spring 2007, compared with 29 percent of Hispanic seventh-graders.

The two also have little patience for the claim that they're serving a select group of students whose parents are involved enough to make a school choice.

Barrett, in recruiting students for his first year, drove up and down South Federal with school fliers, pulling over when he saw kids of middle-school age.

He also stood outside Elitch Gardens amusement park, passing out fliers to families.

Gibbons obtained a list of fifth-graders in selected West Denver neighborhoods - such student lists are available to every principal - and he and his staff went door to door.

Alfredo Huerta, whose daughter Karina is a sixth-grader at West Denver Prep, learned about the school when John Dues, the school's academic chief, knocked on his door.

"We were looking for something better for her," said Huerta, whose older daughter went to the neighborhood middle school, Kepner, and who was concerned about rumors of bullying there.

While an increasing number of families in DPS choose to attend a school outside their neighborhood - nearly 40 percent in 2005-06 - that trend has largely eluded the less affluent and Hispanic children who form the core at West Denver Prep and KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy.

The fact that both schools have waiting lists proves such families, informed of an option, are happy to take it.

Huerta, for one, likes that his daughter is being challenged by hours of daily homework.

"I don't like easy," he said. "I think it's good for her because it is forming her character."

Kristin Waters, principal of Bruce Randolph 6-12 School in north Denver, said she hopes parents of her students feel the same.

Waters held a series of meetings in August to explain to families that the school will no longer promote students who do not meet grade-level expectations.

That's a deviation from the DPS policy giving parents the final say in whether their kids in grades one through eight are held back, even if teachers say they're not ready.

Waters, a DPS traditional school principal who admits checking out charters for ideas, consulted attorneys to ensure she could enforce the change.

A parent who refuses to comply with the plan will be told, "There are 17 other middle schools in the district - maybe this isn't a good fit for you," Waters said.

Key to the change, she said, is that her teachers are increasing academic support such as tutoring for their students. She's figuring out how to pay for that.

"It does take total staff buy-in. It does take a community that is willing to support it and say, 'Hey, we want the best for our kids,' " Waters said, "and a belief in the kids that it can be done."

Nationally, school districts from San Francisco to Cambridge, Mass., are requiring parents to pick among a set of school choices for their children.

That includes Mapleton Public Schools, a 6,000-student district north of Denver, which last fall eliminated neighborhood schools altogether.

Instead, the "all-choice" district requires parents to pick from among 17 small schools and academies, such as a Montessori elementary, a K-12 international academy and a technology-rich high school.

"I believe that choice is what will fill our kids' schools in the future," said Superintendent Charlotte Ciancio. "I don't think people will settle any more for the school in their community, unless they choose the community for the school."

On Oct. 1, when DPS announces its long-awaited list of proposed school closures, Bennet also is expected to release a plan for more innovation in Denver schools.

That will likely include a process allowing principals and others to pitch new school designs.

While Bennet won't talk about what that will look like, he will say that he is interested in new ideas. And he prefers they bubble up from communities rather than be dictated from his corner office.

"I'd like to see schools do whatever it is they can do to establish very intentional school cultures with a very high set of expectations for conduct," he said. "What we have said to principals is, 'The day has long gone when you can simply unlock your front door and expect to fill your school.' "

During the first week of school at West Denver Prep, as students adjusted to more rules and more homework, Gibbons talked to them about a Nelson Mandela quote they will hear throughout the year:

• Issue: Can a traditional DPS neighborhood school set standards for admissions?

• Answer: Yes. Any public school can require students to wear uniforms, sign contracts spelling out homework obligations or limit the number of children per classroom, grade and campus.

• What the law says: "The legal question is, are you providing them an education in the system?" said Maree Sneed, a Washington, D.C., attorney who has argued student assignment issues before the U.S. Supreme Court. "Parents may say, 'I have a right to go to that school; I can see it from my kitchen window' . . . But no one has a constitutional right to go to any particular school."

Teachers, students and parents sign a commitment-to-excellence form outlining the commitments of each party. Examples: Students commit to coming to school from 7:25 a.m. until 5 p.m. Monday-Thursday and 7:25 a.m. until 4 p.m. on Friday.

• West Denver Prep Students, parents, teachers and the head of school sign a family contract outlining expectations for all. Students "commit to do my homework every night" while teachers "commit to grading and returning all homework within one day."

• One DPS school takes a tough stance: Under a new policy at Bruce Randolph 6-12 School, the school will not promote students who do not meet grade-level expectations. This deviates from district policy allowing parents to decide if their children are promoted to the next grade.

• How DPS Superintendent Michael Bennet sees it: "Schools can effect policies that set admissions criteria or requirements like Saturday school or other things. There's an apparent conflict between the ideas of establishing these kinds of rules of the road and serving everyone . . . We have to find a way for that conflict to be resolved. It's a balance, and for a long time, it's been struck in favor of insufficient rules and expectations."

Denver Public Schools is at a crossroads. The district can change the way it serves 72,000 children - or continue a downward spiral of declining enrollment and dismal achievement.

DPS Superintendent Michael Bennet admitted this reality in April after a series in the Rocky Mountain News explored why one in four Denver children do not attend the city's schools.

"It is hard to admit," he wrote in a letter signed by all seven DPS school board members, "but it is abundantly clear that we will fail the vast majority of children in Denver if we try to run our schools the same old way."

Yet the way ahead is not clear. On Oct. 1, Bennet will announce a list of Denver schools to be closed in a bid to save money and funnel those dollars into the district's reform plan to raise achievement.

He'll also announce a way for innovative ideas to take root in DPS, allowing requests to reimagine how some schools operate.

What should the new DPS look like? A district of small, specialized schools? A district of improved neighborhood schools? Or some of both?

Starting today, the Rocky begins an occasional series looking at outside-the-box strategies already working in Denver. Some charter schools, in particular, are making gains with the very children - Hispanic, poor, middle school-aged or older - floundering in traditional DPS schools.

What are schools such as West Denver Preparatory and KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy doing to create success? And is the rest of DPS paying attention? mitchelln@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5245

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE.

WHAT: WEST DENVER PREP CELEBRATES SOME OF THE CITY’S TOP CSAP SCORES
WHEN: July 31, 2007
CONTACT: Contact Chris Gibbons, Head of School, at 303-573-2017 x307. www.westdenverprep.org

West Denver Prep, in its first year of operations, exceeded DPS average proficiency by double-digits in both mathematics and writing, and by 5% in reading.

Fully 66% of West Denver Prep’s sixth graders scored proficient or advanced in math, exceeding the district average by 26%. Students also exceeded the district proficiency average by 13% in writing and 5% in reading. These scores reflect an increase of proficiency of between 8-29% above the 5th grade CSAP scores of these same students.

Among schools composed of more than two-thirds students who qualify for Federal Free or Reduced Lunch, West Denver Prep’s scores ranked 1st in the city in Math, 2nd in Writing, and among the top ten in Reading.(1) In mathematics proficiency, West Denver Prep ranked 3rd among open-enrollment school (2) and 5th among all schools, while exceeding the state average by 6%.

(1)F/R Lunch numbers are for 2005-2006 school years, school accountability reports, www.rockymountainnews.com.

(2)Open-enrollment schools are defined as those that do not have selective admissions programs based on academic results, either comprehensively or embedded within the school.

Charter-school fans want more By Jeremy P. Meyer The Denver Post May 17, 2008

Charter-school fans want more
By Jeremy P. Meyer
The Denver Post
May 17, 2008