A corporate chief executive, an active parent and a couple of former mayors will head a new Denver Public Schools citizens group to work with Superintendent Michael Bennet as he tries to drastically improve the city’s schools.
Qwest CEO Richard Notebaert, Denver parent Anne Bye Rowe, and former Denver Mayors Federico Peña and Wellington Webb will co-chair the “Citizens for Denver’s Schools,” officials announced Thursday.
The committee will have its own not-for-profit status so it can be autonomous and long- lasting.
The four co-chairs join 25 “executive committee” members who include businessman and prominent Republican Bruce Benson.
Also serving on the executive committee is the Rev. Paul Burleson, who is a pastor of Friendship Baptist Church and heads the Greater Metro Denver Ministerial Alliance.
Eventually, the citizens committee will have 100 members.
“We want to make public education the highest priority of the city,” Peña said. “Obviously, the goal is to make the DPS school system the finest in the country.”
Though Citizens for Denver’s Schools is meant to outlive school boards and superintendents as an advocacy organization, its first charge is to dissect Bennet’s “Denver Plan.”
This reform document advocates improving virtually every aspect of the way DPS operates.
“We didn’t write the plan to sit on a shelf,” Bennet said. “It’s something that the broader community needs to understand and embrace.”
Committee members will have to delve into DPS’s dismal statistics: Roughly half the students don’t graduate; the district has faced multimillion-dollar budget shortfalls; enrollment is dropping; and students score below the state average on assessment tests for reading, writing and math.
“We’re not doing the best for our kids,” said co-chairwoman Rowe, who has three kids at Slavens School.
“It’s not that people don’t care, but it’s a huge system that, in some ways, isn’t doing the best for kids.”
The announcement comes at a time when Bennet, who is entering his second year at the helm of DPS, will need broad backing as he and the school board make tough decisions – such as closing schools.
Though the committee will coexist with the school board, some board members on Thursday weren’t worried about their toes getting stepped on.
“I think the depths of the problems we already know,” said Jill Conrad, school board member. “I think they will be bringing a new level of problem-solving that will really tap the community.”
Staff writer Allison Sherry can be reached at 303-820-1377 or asherry@denverpost.com.
