Four months into his tenure, Denver Public Schools Superintendent Michael Bennet has put forward an ambitious plan to guide the city’s schools for years to come.
It sets lofty expectations for Denver schoolchildren, teachers and principals, and for the community. The 82-page report is an awful lot to chew on, but it’s vitally important that residents – even those without children – get to know The Denver Plan, as it’s called. (It can be viewed at thedenverplan.dpsk12.org.)
The plan is a working document, according to Bennet, that’s intended to change and respond to not only external community forces but also internal school realities. Although hundreds of teachers were consulted, there will be plenty of places to tweak.
For the next 60 days, DPS will be looking for feedback on its strategic plan. It needs community buy-in in order to work.
The plan’s goal is higher student achievement and spells out detailed steps for achieving that goal. It raises important ideas for discussion, such as teachers following the same group of kids each year to eliminate the learning curve that comes as teachers get to know new students and their abilities.
One objective is to have teaching experts review literacy and math programs to decide how much they need to be strengthened. It also lists how many minutes of math, reading and writing students must get every day. And a cornerstone of Bennet’s plans for DPS – principal training – is recognizable throughout the document.
The Denver Plan also talks tough about reducing truancy, including possibly closing high school campuses at lunchtime. Far too many students never make it out of high school, and most of the time officials have no idea when or how they slipped through the cracks. The district will implement a uniform method of tracking attendance. (Some schools don’t even keep attendance now.)
Dealing with truancy, and the growing number of English-language learners, is monumental to DPS’s future success.
Some of the ideas, such as closing high school campuses, will draw fire and probably too much attention. We hope they don’t detract from the bulk of the plan, which is intended to create a school environment keyed toward student achievement and teacher quality.
The Denver Plan would require schools to constantly measure student growth and achievement, but it also will prove to be the benchmark on which Bennet’s success at DPS is measured. There is a lot to digest in the plan, but at first blush, it appears to chart an ambitious and desirable future.
