Denver’s math and reading programs will be investigated, parents will be questioned about how they have been treated, and teaching practices will be eyed in an audit of Denver Public Schools performed by an independent group, school leaders said Monday.
Officials from the Council of the Great City Schools will start work in Denver in October, looking at everything from the district’s English-language acquisition program to how well community groups and parents have been invited into the schools.
An assessment of the district’s curriculum and other special programs was requested by Superintendent Michael Bennet in his first month on the job.
“We want input from groups that may feel like they have not been adequately heard,” Michael Casserly, executive director for the Washington, D.C.-based council, said while visiting Denver on Monday.
This assessment will help Bennet in forming his “strategic plan.” Due out in November and anxiously anticipated by many in and outside the district, the plan is expected to outline changes and ideas about how to improve Denver Public Schools.
Five to seven auditors – people who hold posts in other urban districts – will arrive in Denver on Oct. 2. They will talk to community members, parents, teachers and principals during their three-day stay.
They will also look at DPS’s curricula, including its multimillion-dollar literacy program, to see if what’s going on in the classrooms lines up with what’s being tested in the Colorado Student Assessment Program, the state’s standardized tests.
In the past several years, the council has looked into the curriculum in Philadelphia, St. Louis and Washington, D.C. A group is heading to New Orleans this week to assess damage in the schools after Hurricane Katrina devastated much of the city.
Bennet, who is working on his strategic plan, said he will weigh the council’s findings along with other input from schools and the community.
He said he welcomes information from outside experts about what is and is not working in the district
“It’s music to my ears,” he said.
Staff writer Allison Sherry can be reached at 303-820-1377 or asherry@denverpost.com.
