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The Denver faculty board is contemplating pausing any future faculty closures till closures which are underway are executed and plans for vacant buildings are finalized.
The proposal comes three months after the board voted in November to shut or partially shut 10 colleges with low enrollment on the finish of this faculty yr. Greater than a yr and a half earlier, the board voted to shut three small colleges within the spring of 2023.
The proposal doesn’t embody a timeframe for a moratorium on faculty closures, although a number of board members floated the concept of two or three years throughout a gathering Thursday.
“We persistently heard from group, ‘That is an excessive amount of. We have to catch our breath. Yearly you’re speaking about closing colleges and there’s this checklist and there’s a number of nervousness,’” stated board member Michelle Quattlebaum, who proposed the pause.
The board has not set a date to vote on the proposal, which might amend the board’s faculty closure coverage. Board President Carrie Olson stated she would add it to the Feb. 20 assembly agenda for a primary studying. The modification should have a primary studying and a second studying earlier than the board can vote.
The faculty closure coverage, often called Govt Limitation 18, requires the superintendent to current a proposed timeline every August for college closures for the next faculty yr. The coverage says the superintendent will make a advice to shut or consolidate particular colleges every November and the board will vote that very same month.
The proposed modification says the superintendent “shall not current any new suggestions till the permitted advice has been executed.” It features a caveat that claims the superintendent can advocate a closure “if there’s a vital change in enrollment, a big change in funding, or an unexpected emergency.”
Superintendent Alex Marrero advised the board that it could realistically take a minimal of two years to execute a faculty closure, together with finalizing plans for the longer term use of the constructing. The district is simply beginning that course of for the faculties set to shut this spring.
Quattlebaum stated educators and households have advised the board that they anxiously await anytime the superintendent releases an inventory of colleges in danger for closure. The proposed pause is supposed so as to add “some normalcy to this course of, some consistency, and a few reduction,” she stated.
“What we don’t need to occur is we don’t need our academics, our educators leaving colleges for concern that they might find yourself on an inventory,” Quattlebaum stated. “As a result of when our workers leaves, the standard of training goes down.”
Neighboring Jeffco Public Faculties enacted an analogous faculty closure moratorium a number of years in the past that has now expired. Jeffco has closed 21 colleges since 2021 as a result of declining enrollment and is now contemplating closing or redesigning one other.
Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.