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Moms For Liberty in Woodland Park?

In the last board meeting, one of the public comments, by a gentleman named Drew, mentioned the threat that some extremist groups can present to school boards. Moms For Liberty is one such national group that was recently labeled as ‘extremist’ by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The question whether Moms For Liberty has any influence in Woodland Park could perhaps be put to rest by this tweet from Woodland Park school board director Cassie Kimbrell:

Darcy Schoening is the chair of Moms for Liberty down in Colorado Springs:

Open Meetings Law case in Denver mirrors WPSD

There’s an ongoing court case in Douglas County, alleging the board violating open meetings laws by discussing the firing of their superintendent in private one on one discussions. This had previous been a gray area of Open Meetings Law…seeming to violate the spirit of the law while not actually being prevented by the law. This latest case though might be setting legal precedent in this area, as a Judge is ruling one on one discussions is a violating, saying “Circumventing the statute by a series of private one-on-one meetings at which public business is discussed and/or decisions reached is a violation of the purpose of the statute, not just its spirit.”

Interim Superintendent Ken Witt even admitted that he has one on one and one on two meetings with board members, though there’s never been any doubt prior that this is what the board was doing. Maybe the best documented case was their total lack of deliberation when deciding upon a new board member to replace a vacant seat.

With the law still not black and white in this matter, it doesn’t mean we can expect any change in WPSD’s board behavior. But hopefully it’ll lead to clarification of the law and improved government transparency statewide.

WPHS class of 2024 sets all-time high SAT score for district

The SAT scores are in, and the WPHS class of 2024 has set a new district record! They achieved a mean score of 1022, which is 33 points higher than the state average and 67 points higher than the national average. This is the fifth year in a row of improved test scores and a testament to the improvements put in place by previous board and administrative teams. With the administrative team mostly changed for next year (district-level admin staff is mostly new, MS and one elementary principals are new), and the mass exodus of high teachers leaving the district this year (plus the adoption of the ‘low level learning’ in the American Birthright standard for social studies), it’s unclear how this upward trend in test scores will be affected.

You can read the email that Principal Burr sent to staff below:

I am pleased to report to you that WPHS SAT scores have been shared with the school, and the class of 2024 continued the school’s remarkable trend of substantial increases in Cohort Scores (year over year).  As well, the WPHS Class of 2024 set an all time high SAT mean score of 1022. 

The 1022 score is 33 points higher than the state average and 67 points higher than the national average. For the fifth year in a row, each class cohort continued to improve (year over year) in comparative data.  Cohort growth is a hallmark of school improvement.  And each cohort continues to exceed previous cohort accomplishments as WPHS sets new achievement benchmarks each year.

Most remarkable of all, the  Class of ’24 SAT Math mean score is just 4 points shy of meeting the Colorado Benchmark for Career and College Readiness.  Comparatively, the State Mean is 16 points lower than the CACR Math benchmark and the WPHS Class of 2019 was 24 points lower than the CACR Math benchmark. 

The Class of ’24 has an Evidence Based Reading and Writing mean score of 525 (which is 55 points higher than the Colorado Benchmark for CACR).

Five years ago, we embarked on a journey to embed the philosophy of Standards Based Learning and Grading.  With the help of Marzano Resources,  the school improvement skill-set within the HS Admin Team and Tina Cassens, the school staff made a commitment to improve post-secondary opportunities for our students.   Substantially enhanced curriculum standards, the use of the Summit Platform (and now, Illustrative Math), and increased Rigor / Academic Expectations all have paid remarkable dividends for WP students.  

Where once, just 22% of our students were meeting Career and College Readiness expectations (2017), the class of 2024 now has 68% of its students meeting EBRW and 44% meeting Math CACR benchmarks (comparatively – state percentages = 59% meeting EBRW CACR and 35% meeting Math — national percentages = 51% meeting EBRW and 29% meeting Math).    Looking ahead, the class of 2026 is currently on pace for 77% to meet the EBRW benchmark and 54% to meet the Math benchmark. 

We are eager to share this outstanding news with our WP Community.  Teachers and administrators across the district have worked hard and contributed much to this incredible outcome.  Celebrating our success is a fundamental tenet of the High Reliability School framework.  We look forward to seeing the reaction of our stakeholders.

Kevin Burr,  Principal

Woodland Park High School

Staffing updates for ’23-24 WPSD school year

With 57 current job openings in the district and a hostile administration due to Ken Witt’s leadership, there’s a lot of concern about whether those openings will be filled. We’re learning some things from district insiders that’s worth sharing. This information comes from various sources and does not have direct evidence to back it up, though looking at the job openings as well as resignations to date goes a long way towards substantiating the claims.

  • Both registered nurses are leaving, but there’s only one new job opening posted.
  • The special ed programs are being severely impacted. At Gateway, the mild moderate teacher resigned, autism (PLACE) program K-6 and early childhood teachers resigned, social worker resigned, one special ed early childhood teacher signed, and so there are currently NO special ed teachers for grades K-6 at Gateway. At Columbine, the mild moderate special ed teacher resigned, the affective needs teacher resigned, a school social worker resigned, and there are currently NO special ed teachers left at Columbine. At the middle school, the affective needs teacher left, and they are not planning to hire an affective needs teacher to replace that position, the mild moderate disabilities teacher resigned, a school social worker resigned, and two special ed teachers resigned remain (one significant support needs teacher and one mild moderate needs teacher). No special ed teachers have resigned from WPHS and Summit Elementary, according to sources inside the district.
  • The PLACE Programs and the Affective Needs Program are Center Based Programs. These programs serve students under the Ute Pass BOCES school districts of WPSD, Cripple Creek Victor Schools and Manitou Springs School District and were originally established to help all three districts consolidate specialized services and staff to central locations. These programs were created by YEARS of hard work and VERY dedicated staff. Every single staff member who left sited the current board and superintendent as their reasons for leaving. All special education programs require teachers to be highly qualified in their area of expertise. In a good year, these positions are difficult to fill. As of this past week, there had been no applicants to fill these positions. Public schools are required to provide a Free Appropriate Public Education to all special education students. Special Education students and their parents deserve answers NOW as to how the board and the superintendent in this district plan to solve these very serious problems caused by their words and actions.
  • Due to the massive exodus at Gateway Elementary, both Columbine and Summit are being “requested” to move one of their teachers to Gateway to help fill that gap. We hear rumors of other teachers being forced to change positions in the district, too.
  • The High School is rumored to be shifting the role of counselors in the building…they won’t be hiring mental health professionals as counselors, but will instead focus these roles as ‘academic advisors’ (the state of Colorado doesn’t require counselors to be mental health professionals).

5/28/2023 Weekly Update

Last week:

Here’s what’s coming up this week:

  • School wraps up! The board will be focusing next month on finalizing a budget for next year. Within that budget, we expect to hear a proposal to outsource building security, most likely to Teller County Sheriff Mikesell’s private security company. Also, mentioned in the DAC meeting was that the board is looking to use $1 million from the reserves account to pay for building security upgrades (one-time expenses, not recurring like salary).
  • After the next board meeting on June 14th, we should have a better estimate of exactly how many staff are leaving.

Fact check – Letters to the Editor

Board Director David Illingworth II, up for reelection this fall, submitted this letter to the editor in the Courier…let’s do some fact checking:

Many have complained about not enough space at the May 10 Board of Education meeting (in fact my own wife was unable to get in). These complaints are either misinformed or misleading.

First, the overwhelming majority of our meetings are held in that meeting space, and it is exceptionally rare that there is not enough room for everyone. We can’t know when that will happen, but we do know that there was very heavy attendance at this meeting due to the presence of NBC News and the coordination and organizing by well-known local activists whose goal was to swamp the meeting and get on TV. They were there for the cameras and the attention, not the schools or the students.

Second, we cannot change the fire code or the weather. Everyone who could not get into the meeting room was offered the chance to watch the meeting from the WPHS auditorium, rather than stand in the rain. They all declined and decided, of their own free will, to stay outside and shout where the TV cameras just happened to be.

Finally, everyone was able to sign up for public comment, and many of those who addressed the BOE that night were escorted in from outside, so they had the same opportunities as those who had arrived earlier.

Let’s be clear: anyone who stood in the rain did so of their own choice after refusing staff offers to come inside WPHS where it was warm and dry. No one was denied the opportunity for shelter or to publicly address the BOE.

Dave Illingworth, Woodland Park Board of Education

source

I don’t think we can quantify whether it’s ‘exceptionally rare that there is not enough room for everyone’, but the board commonly opened up an overflow area outside of the main conference room for those occurrences. At other times, they held the board meetings in either the high school auditorium, or the middle school commons area, to accommodate larger crowds.

Both the pro-board side, and the anti-board side, encouraged heavy attendance by their respective followers. The board had no reason to expect that a 90 person room would provide sufficient space for everyone, not when all indications were that turnout at this meeting would be extraordinary.

No one was offered a chance to watch the meeting from the auditorium. Towards the end of the public comment portion, I was offered a chance to take shelter in the commons area (not the auditorium), with no promise of any livestream in there.

The NBC TV camera was inside the conference room, not outside as he claims. A local TV reporter had her camera outside.

He claims ‘no one was denied the opportunity for shelter or to publicly address the BOE.’ That second part is false. The BOE cut public comment off at 30 minutes as has been their custom for a while now. Not everyone who signed up to publicly address the BOE was given that opportunity. Further, they were asked to wait outside in the rain to see if their name would be called (the commons area wasn’t opened up as shelter until public comment was almost over).

What about the claims that fire code meant they couldn’t open up the overflow area? We have not found any evidence to support that claim. Yes, the main conference room has a 90 person capacity limit sign posted, and that seems reasonable for that size of a space. However, our inspection of the overflow area revealed no posted capacity signs. A CORA request (#446) requested the fire department documents listing the maximum occupancy for those rooms:

I am requesting the official Fire Department documents listing the maximum occupancy for the WPSD District Office, the Distric Office Large Conference room and the two district office rooms that have traditionally been used to accommodate overflow for the WPSD BOE meetings.

This was met with the district’s response of, “There are no responsive documents to this request.”

Not only did the BOE recruit Charis students to pack the conference room, but they encouraged those students to show up early – an hour ahead of time, the line was already long enough that those showing up after did not get in to the building. As evidenced by audience reactions during the meeting, the room was clearly packed with BOE supporters. The BOE knew there would be a large crowd, did not choose to move the meeting to a larger space, and took steps to actually reduce the number of people that would be allowed to attend the meeting (when compared to previous meetings).

Teacher residency program in WPSD

Our district intends to establish a teacher residency program in partnership with Public Education and Business Coalition (PEBC), as outline in this MOU. This would bring in student teachers to the district, working along side mentor teachers for their first year, before transitioning to classroom teachers for a subsequent two year commitment to the district. PEBC provides some training to the student teachers for two days a week. It’s not clear whether mentor teachers receive any additional compensation for this work. Student teachers will be with their mentors four days a week; Thursdays will be in-person training with PEBC.

Cost is $2,500 per student teacher, with an additional $6,000 once that student teacher completes their third year (one year training plus two years classroom). Sounds like an interesting program. I’m not thrilled with the classrooms being live-streamed to the PEBC and their subcontractors, though COVID kinda shattered that privacy expectation already.

A quote from the MOU:

In order to increase retention of excellent teachers in schools and elevate the teaching profession, PEBC has created a teacher residency program, in which each participant (a “Resident”) receives training and education while he or she completes a residency year and two subsequent years of teaching within the Resident’s hiring school district

November election can return normalcy to the district

Woodland Park, Colorado, is a great example of what CAN happen with an extremist conservative board takes over and starts making changes.  This board is driving teachers and students out of the district, but voters have a very real chance of shifting the balance this November when three of the five board director positions are up for election.  There’s so much going on, that to get up to speed, check out the article and TV story NBC News did on us, and also the most recent one from Colorado Public Radio.

A wonderful slate of three candidates has announced their intent to run for school board this fall and I support them completely.  At this point in the race, the candidates are focused on fundraising and working on messaging.  If you’d like to help us take back control of this school board this fall, please consider donating to support their campaigns and send a message that we value traditional public education in this country. Any amount, no matter how small will help! Better yet, consider a small recurring monthly donation to help them between now and November. We need to get all three of these people elected!

Read more about the candidates in this article.

You can donate using these links:

Mike Knott: https://electmikeknottwpsd.com

Seth Bryant: https://sites.google.com/sb4wpsd.com/sethbryantforwpsd

Keegan Barkley: https://keeganbarkley4wpsd.com

Thank you for your support!

Podcast: Will This be on the Test? Teacher Pod. Part 2

This is Part 2 of our two part story about Woodland Park, Colorado, a bucolic little town in the shadow of Pikes Peak. A place where the schools have been overtaken by a group of people who know little to nothing about education. They also give zero f*cks about the faculty and staff of the school district.

Listen on Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Part 1 and 2 both feature Logan Ruths (former employee) and Matt Gawlowski (parent of a student in the district).

If you missed part 1, you can catch it here on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

5/21/2023 Weekly Update

Last Week:

  • After that May 10th board meeting, we were all anxiously awaiting NBC’s primetime segment on us, and they finally aired it on Thursday.
  • Ken Witt was interviewed on local radio station KOA. Quote of the day: he “knows” the CEA and WPEA “hate America.”
  • Ken Witt loaned a US flag to the district to be put on display, and used almost $600 of district money to have it framed. Turns out it’s not a valid US flag, it’s the ’42 star’ version that was never made official.
  • We found some more recent resignation letters in a CORA request. These help shed some insight into what’s going on with staff.
  • We received a copy of an email that a job applicant sent to the district, after withdrawing from the application process. This board and superintendent’s actions are impacting our district’s ability to attract candidates.
  • The district has a new email filter…your freedom of speech to the board no longer extends to words such as ‘crap’. Emails contain that and, presumably, other words will be automatically rejected.
  • We published a few small things learned in recent CORA requests. Including the fact that Witt’s contract with ERBOCES has been modified to reduce his salary, presumably since he’s not working there full-time anymore (his WPSD contract has not been similarly modified).
  • CNN had a crew out in Colorado Springs, checking in on what Moms For Liberty is up to down there.
  • The District Accountability Committee (DAC) held their regular monthly meeting. In it, Illingworth mentioned they’re looking at spending $1 million from district reserves on security upgrades (this would be for one-time costs, not recurring things like personnel). They’re also working on a plan for security personnel but not providing details yet. The discussion on budget was brief and unfortunately, no new detail that wasn’t shown in the 5/10 board meeting. Lastly, there was a productive conversation about how to improve school crosswalk safety, specifically the one in front of the Middle School that everyone agrees is dangerous.

Here’s what’s coming up this week:

  • Class of 2023 graduates Saturday! Congratulations!
    • We’re told Ken Witt will be speaking at the graduation ceremony.
    • Please don’t disrupt the ceremony during Witt’s speech; this is the seniors’ special day and we should not do anything to spoil that. However, it might be a good opportunity to actually speak to Witt one on one, either before or after graduation.
    • As is customary, members of the board may be present; this event is being classified as a ‘work session’ so that they all may attend without being in violation of Open Meetings Law.