As a parent navigating Denver’s school choice, I was frequently in circles where parents would ask each other, “Is that school a good school?” But, by deeming a school “good,” what does that actually mean?
For one parent, it may mean that the school is a warm and welcoming environment for their child with special needs. For another, it may mean that the school offers robust extracurriculars that motivate their child to get out of bed each morning. For another, it may mean the school has staff members who share the language or culture of their child.
But, the public mechanism utilized by Denver Public Schools in the past for declaring a school to be “good” – the DPS School Performance Framework (SPF) – offered limited visibility regarding any of these attributes. The SPF was a color-coded system primarily based on a single test, and, therefore, hopelessly narrow in scope.
The SPF labeled schools as blue, green, orange, yellow or red. This rainbow of colors assigned to DPS schools was laid to rest in August 2020 through DPS Board Resolution 4079, which was based on the recommendations of the community-led Reimagining the SPF Committee. The majority of the committee members, myself included, considered it a triumph.
Under the former SPF system, having the red label had become a “scarlet letter” for schools that often caused families to unfairly write some schools off as a viable option. And, extensive national research has verified that rankings based on standardized test scores are most directly correlated to family income rather than the quality of education students are receiving.
I saw this harm transpire in my neighborhood school, Manual High School, where my son now joyfully attends, which was deemed “red”. This label did not reflect the school’s stellar culture, its inspirational music and sports programming and the heroic efforts being undertaken by staff to help all students thrive. It masked the school’s laudable graduation rate and gave a mere pittance in its scoring to the high level of parent and student satisfaction that the school enjoys.
The SPF didn’t provide a way to showcase the dedication of the teachers and the way that students often refer to their Manual community as “family”. And, DPS chose Manual as a Whole Child Distinguished School during the 2024-2025 school year, but this would not have been reflected in the former framework.
The red label became an albatross around Manual’s neck as they witnessed families “choicing out” of a school that could have been a wonderful fit. I believe that Manual’s current trajectory of increasing enrollment has been aided by no longer being publicly derided as a “red school”.
In reviewing Megan Schrader’s article on Feb. 8, I applaud her for shining a light on the dearth of data available to families. But, one piece of the article was off the mark. The purpose of Resolution 4079 was not to hide data but to actually vastly expand it. I, along with other community members, fought to ensure this expansion made it into the resolution.
The resolution directed DPS to create a dashboard that included academic data plus a plethora of additional data such as school culture and whole child measures. We also dreamed of a dashboard that highlighted not just the “output” of schools but the “inputs” – the resources and supports afforded to schools.
We dreamed of a dashboard where school leaders could tell their school’s story and provide context for their data. Our goal was not to resurrect the era of color coding, ranking, shaming, and blaming rather it was to provide the community with a more nuanced and more holistic picture of our schools.
So, we are now sitting three and half years since the Board directed the district to create a dashboard, and it still hasn’t come to fruition. Therefore, with the exception of the state SPF which is more myopic than the DPS SPF, the community has been left flying blind when it comes to understanding the strengths and weaknesses of the schools in DPS.
As a result, we’ve missed opportunities to shine a light on schools that deserve a high-five from the community. We’ve also been deprived of visibility into our schools that are struggling so we can know where to advocate for more resources and support.
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But, there are signs that give me hope. I am involved with grassroots groups that have been researching, thinking and dreaming about the good a well-designed dashboard could do. I am hopeful that DPS will take the steps necessary so that the dashboard design work can launch by next fall. In the interim, a local nonprofit, RootED Denver, expended tremendous effort to produce the Mile High School Guide, which at least provides families with additional information not available on DPS’s own School Finder, such as teacher demographics, student/parent survey data and staff to student ratios to name a few. But, by no fault of its own, it is limited in its scope and there is so much more that community members are interested in knowing about our schools.
It has been three and a half years. Our community is ready to start the work.
I hope that DPS will leverage the groundwork laid by the existing Mile High School Guide and partner with the community to co-create a holistic dashboard, so our community can spend the next school year formulating a dashboard that ensures the transparency the district should champion as a public institution and the visibility to information that can help families find the best school fit for their children. It is time.
Karen Mortimer is a DPS parent who served on the 2019-2020 Reimagining the SPF Committee. She is also the Chair of the DPS District Accountability Committee.
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