Denver charter schools face long list of requirements for ELLs [English-language learners]
No public school in Denver can claim the academic accolades of Denver School of Science and Technology, or DSST, a network of charter schools vying to create schools as diverse as the city. No public school in Denver had lower academic growth than SOAR Oakland, a northeast Denver charter school that tried to turn around a failed elementary school with some of the city's poorest kids.
Yet in satisfying a court order to better serve English-language learners in Denver Public Schools classrooms, SOAR succeeded while DSST fell short, according to district reviews of their programs.
SOAR Oakland gave up its charter and closed last spring after the district voiced concern about student performance. DSST submitted a plan to address deficiencies ...
For three decades, a federal court order has required the state's largest school district to provide "meaningful and appropriate" language-acquisition services to student ...
The latest update to the order, in 2012, put considerable new demands on charter schools, a cornerstone of school reform efforts led by DPS Superintendent Tom Boasberg.
The results so far are mixed, with many schools falling short. District and charter officials say they embrace the requirements while acknowledging that fulfilling them does not always equate to academic success, as was true with DSST and SOAR Oakland ...
In the past two years, DPS has denied four charter school applications or renewals for many shortcomings, including a failure to serve non-English speakers. Other charters facing likely denials withdrew their applications.
DPS charter schools faced requirements for serving English learners before. But the revised court order from 2012, called a consent decree, for the first time included a section on charter schools with precise expectations ...
Charter schools with 15 or more English learners must provide parents notice in their native language of educational options and designate a staff person to oversee programs.
Charters also must provide dedicated English-language development services, which typically means a separate class. All teachers must be certified in English-language instruction, a standard most schools were not meeting ...
At Pioneer Charter School in Denver, school leaders sought to hire certified teachers and turned to them to help train others before certification was required, school director Richard Barrett said ...
Still, Pioneer saw its scores dip this year on DPS's school performance framework, a color-coded report card that measures student academic proficiency and growth, college readiness, student engagement, parent satisfaction and enrollment ...
About 75 percent of Pioneer's students are English learners. Roughly 98 percent are Latino and qualify for a free or discounted lunch, a measure of poverty ...