Denver Public Schools Superintendent Michael Bennet and school board members will today begin a series of discussions about the state of the city’s 18 traditional middle schools – most of which wrestle with low student achievement and falling enrollment.
It is the first time in four years the school board will take on middle-grades education, said board president Theresa Peña.
Some schools have half-empty buildings with principals struggling to keep students and parents from walking away.
“We’re not making academic gains,” Peña said. “We’re not getting one year’s worth of learning in one year’s worth of teaching. … We’re not doing a good job.”
Between last year and this school year, almost 600 fewer sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders attended middle schools citywide. That compares with a 924-student gain in elementary schools. The district has about 73,300 students.
Middle schools also have some of the lowest demand of any buildings in Denver, according to data from an independent panel studying school closures.
Even at the city’s most popular schools, the “demand” – measured by the number of kids who “choice into” the school and the number of neighborhood kids who attend – is average. Most middle schools have low or very low demand, according to district data.
“The largest erosion has been at the traditional middle-school level,” said Bennet, who said he will reveal more data at today’s board meeting. “What we’ve realized talking to parents in this school district is that every school needs to have a compelling story to tell.”
Many parents, though, seem to simply want a safe environment and a way to easily find out how their students are doing.
“I’m looking for a place where I feel welcome when I walk in the door,” said Amy Carlson, whose has kids in the first, third, and fourth grades at McKinley- Thatcher Elementary.
She is considering leaving the district for middle school.
“It was easy to go to DPS for elementary, but it’s not as easy for middle school,” she said.
Middle-school principals across the city say they are trying to promote the very attributes that make schools attractive: safety, order, a good environment and strong academics.
At Merrill Middle, principal Ann Greenfield is working on a marketing campaign similar to a city council race, with fliers, signs and mailers. She has gone to every surrounding elementary school to talk to parents.
“There is still this lingering fear that there are kids (at Merrill) who just aren’t very nice,” said Greenfield, whose school has about 620 students but a capacity for 1,000.
Principal Hans Keyser at 590-student Lake Middle School has been canvassing the Sloan’s Lake neighborhood, even meeting with real estate agents, to push his new International Baccalaureate program that starts this fall.
Despite the new program, the school’s enrollment is projected to fall by about 75 kids.
In other metro-area districts, administrators work to ease the transition into middle school. Some Jefferson County schools keep sixth-graders in elementary schools and send seventh- and eighth-graders to their own buildings.
In Cherry Creek, eighth- graders are paired with new sixth-graders as mentors to help them find their way around, said district spokeswoman Tustin Amole.
Parent Amy Ames, whose fourth-grader attends McKinley-Thatcher, said she isn’t looking for anything special – just a place with “average kids.”
“Where are the average kids going? That’s where I want my kid to go,” she said.
Carlson agreed. Her daughter, she says, is “not an art prodigy, she’s not a foreign-language prodigy,” Carlson said. “She’s just a kid.”
Staff writer Allison Sherry can be reached at 303-954-1377 or asherry@denverpost.com.
