Jeffco can close another school, but she wants the community to design the replacement

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The Jeffco School District is considering closing a school that looks after classes 7-12 and turns them into a special high school where the students would study for certain career paths.

The design plan for Jefferson Jr./Sr. The High School in Edgewater was discussed by Jeffco School Board on Wednesday after it was first presented to the community last month.

The district does not call the proposed changes. Rather, it calls a transition, although the building would probably not serve any students for at least a year and could serve fewer grades when reopened. Unlike in the past, the district leaders say that they have time to work on the plan and to want the community’s input. No final decision was made.

“If we find that there is support for this plan, we can build something with the community that gives real excitement and swing” director for strategic initiatives. A closure would only happen in the school year 2026-27.

The draft of the plan is the result of a school border of the district, which was commissioned last year and which examines the long -term residents of the current school sorting patterns of the district. The study showed that the Jefferson articulation area was very much in the district and was expected that it should continue to record the recovery declines. If the enrollment prove this autumn that the estimates were on the right track, the district had to create a plan, said the district managers.

At the moment Jefferson Jr./Sr. High serves 629 students, somewhat from the official number of 594 students from last year. A little more than 78% of school students qualify for subsidized meals, a level of poverty.

The border study of the district gave some short -term recommendations for border changes in the district and some long -term recommendations that could lead to more school consolidations in the future.

At the moment, Jeffco leaders said that they are not considering any changes to other schools.

Compared to the other short-term recommendations, the border study proposed a certain change in the Jefferson articulation area, but came to the conclusion that the border was not sustainable due to the expected declining registration. The study estimated that Jefferson Jr./sr in the school year 2027-28. Only about 372 students would serve high.

Since then, the district has adjusted these figures and told the school authority on Wednesday that the school serves 447 students in four years, which are still far below the school’s capacity.

The study also examined the opportunity to reorganize school boundaries to compensate for the enrollment. However, it found that due to the choice of the school, which enables so many students to choose a school outside their neighborhood, border changes have little effects on enrollment of the enrollment.

In the school year 2023-24, the study resulted in 40% of all Jeffco students a school outside their named border.

In the border of Jefferson Jr./Sr. High and found that 47% of families select other middle or high schools.

“It is unlikely that it is probably not forced to change the registration behavior of our families without closing a school and eliminating this option,” the report says.

“We look at an unfortunate victim of the privilege of election for families,” said Erin Kenworthy, board member of Jeffco. “In particular, my concern is that we see a different title that I am essentially abandoned at school due to the choice of community. It is a really hard reality. “

The district employee pointed out that demography also plays a major role at the registration institute in the neighborhood.

“Edwater as a city is changing really quickly,” said Lisa Relou, the head of the district. “The gentrification takes place at a quick pace.”

Relou also pointed out that the School district of Denver had only recommended on the other side of Edwater to close the nearby Colfax Elementary for a low enrollment. This school was spared for the time being.

The study also showed that the district looks after about 91% of children in the district, which means that the recovery declines can not only be attributed to students that select options outside of the district such as private schools or homeschool.

Even creating a special programming “does not necessarily attract new families to Jeffco. Instead, these programs simply encouraged more movement within the district themselves, ”the study said.

Nevertheless, the district employees spoke about Jefferson Jr./Sr on Wednesday. High. The design of the district from the district would close the school for the school year 2026-27 and reopen it a year later as a new option school for schoolchildren.

The plan would also get students of the sixth grade out of primary schools in the region, so that by 2026-27, Lumberg and Edwater Elementary Schools would only serve the preschool to fifth grade. For the secondary class, the neighborhood would merge with the articulation area of ​​the wheat ridge, so that the students feed themselves into the Everitt Middle School and then into the Wheat Ridge High School.

In the next few months, the district is planning to organize “Co-Design sessions” with the community to explore the plan in more detail, with a focus on the type of school Jefferson Jr./Sr. High would change.

Two original options include a focus on career education, but one would enable the students to attend part-time at the newly designed school, similar to the Warren tech model of the district. The second option would be a full-time career school.

A board member described the proposal as “ambiguous”.

Member Danielle Varda said: “It sounds very much as if you were closing a school, consolidating and finding out what should do with the building, only said in different ways. I think people feel the same way. “

Superintendent Tracy Dorland said because the municipality’s district allows you to plan you have no answers to all questions that are asked by families and parishioners.

“I have the feeling that there was no experience, especially in this community, but I think in many of our communities in which the leadership of the districts sits at the table and says:” Let us talk about it, we have not answered everything, And people believe in us and understand that the other side of the coin of the district does not have all the answers to bring ambiguity and need of the district management for people, solutions and ideas, ”said Dorland. “It is really unknown area.”

The Jeffco School District, who has already closed 21 schools since 2021 due to great registration waste, which has 75,495 students, the second largest district of the state.

At the time of these school closings, the district undertook not to close high school and published a moratorium for such closings, but the moratorium has ended.

According to the border study, Jeffco still has 18 schools that have a capacity of under 60%. The study predicted this number to grow to 28 schools by 2027-28. At the same time, seven schools are over 100% capacity. In 2027-28, the study predicted six schools to have capacity.

District leader said the decision to close or pass Jefferson Jr./Sr. It is not high, the fear is that the district, if the school’s registration problem is not addressed, must close in a few years if the enrollment does not become sustainable.

The first community co-design meeting is planned for February 11th.

Correction: This story has been updated to correct the name of the school board, Erin Kenworthy.

Jaenia Robles is a reporter from CHALKBEAT COLORADO, which covers K-12 school districts and multilingual education. Contact yeenia at [email protected].

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