Woodland Park Middle School obituary | Guest column

From the 1/31/2024 Pikes Peak Courier:

Woodland Park Middle School (WPMS) left this world on Jan. 19. It was declared dead to the public by email. WPMS is survived by its students, staff, parents, alumni, and community.

Woodland Park Middle School was born three decades ago to a community on the rise. A community full of hope with job opportunities for young families and natural attractions to support the growth of the area and a healthy school system. Woodland Park’s new middle school was a symbol of this community’s ascent.

WPMS was an in-between place which the community sought to give our kids an opportunity to thrive as they figured out who they were. It was a place for students who were not quite little kids anymore but not ready for the responsibilities of high school.

Many people reflect on their middle school years as the worst years of their life. Yet, for many, WPMS was something different. Former students described it as a safe place to mess up and have bad days. It was a place where students could fail, learn, and grow. Some said it was like a family, a place to be loved, a place for some tough honesty and accountability. It was never a school solely focused on academics. For 30 years, it was a place where kindness, integrity, and responsibility were just as important lessons as math and reading.

WPMS attracted quality teachers from across the country: retired military, former lawyers, field biologists, entrepreneurs, new and old teachers. It was a place where former students returned to teach because they believed in the mission and culture of teaching and connecting with squirrely 11-14 year old kids.

In its infancy, some even remarked that the WPMS building looked more like a shopping mall than a school. Sadly, its fate would be that of many shopping malls across the country.

In the early 2000s, a recession struck a blow to WPMS and Woodland Park’s schools as many businesses in the community and down the pass failed. People lost jobs and young families with children found it difficult to afford the cost of housing. The student enrollment began to decline.

In our society, people began to look for new opportunities to get what they wanted. Instead of the places which bring community together, people sought the convenience of their home computer or drove to specialty schools and stores which could meet their specific needs.

Woodland Park Middle School would never recover from these setbacks despite attempts to attract new students. WPMS chose to live life to the fullest: innovative programs, dances and pep rallies, expanding athletic opportunities, improving student spaces with new equipment and murals, field trips, exposition nights and authentic experiences for students.

However, it was not enough. Those from inside and outside of the community fought against Woodland Park Middle School’s efforts and it eventually succumbed to its fate.

Celebration of Life services forthcoming.

Memories, stories, and reflections can be sent to wpmsmemorial@gmail.com

Greg Spalding

1/31/2024 Letters to the Editor

From the 1/31/2024 Pikes Peak Courier:

Divisive at best

As a district parent, I am flabbergasted by the decision to extend Ken Witt’s contract as the WPSD Superintendent – with guaranteed, taxpayer-funded raises no less – without any formal discussion or evaluation. When Mr. Witt knowingly and intentionally broke the law and violated the first amendment rights of teachers, was that not worth even a mention? Is the continued hemorrhaging of staff under Mr. Witt not worth digging into? Is Mr. Witt’s alarming lack of transparency – both to the school board and the community –simply par for the course now? Should feedback from Mr. Witt’s subordinates not be solicited or even considered?

At best, Ken Witt is a divisive outsider who neither lives in the Woodland Park School District nor seeks to better understand and heal it. At worst, he is intentionally ripping at whatever tenuous seams remain holding friends and neighbors together while pouring hundreds of thousands of our tax dollars into his personal bank account. With so many less incendiary superintendent candidates out there, how can Mick Bates, Cassie Kimbrell, and Suzanne Patterson allow this disturbing behavior to continue unchecked?

Sarah Voget, Woodland Park

WPSD board: Fiscal conservatives?

January 17, our school board renewed a contract for Superintendent Ken Witt—expiring in June. Why hurry?

The offer: A $15,000 dollar raise (to $170,000), plus perks including 5% guaranteed annual increase and potentially $15,000 in bonuses. He retains his part time job for an organization championing charter schools and can work remotely—no required days in-district. While previous superintendents highly involved themselves in the community, most serving on the Chamber of Commerce, Witt has little to lose residing in Monument, with few visits to our schools and no performance review.

Salaries from similar-sized districts reveal Witt’s as high to mid-range—though other superintendents work daily, and have around 20 years’ experience and at minimum Master’s degrees.

Our teachers’ starting salaries ($42,000) are mid to low of comparative schools; only Cripple Creek pays lower, though our cost of living is 9% beyond the national average and median housing price is over $500,000. The majority hold master’s degrees. They’re required to work per district calendar and aren’t guaranteed raises or bonuses.

Witt’s contract was offered despite declining enrollment. October 2022’s pupil count was 1,977; October 2023 count was 1820 (decrease of 157, or 7%). His salary only comes from the 1422 non-charter students—a significantly smaller pot than pre-Merit Academy days. Meanwhile, parent protests remain at an all-time high.

Who wrote the contract? Clearly the BOE didn’t; this wasn’t on the agenda and was provided 15 minutes prior to vote. Who is watching our tax dollars? Can we afford this?

Carol Greenstreet, Woodland Park

School superintendent tries to stop interview after question about program funds

In the email, the middle school principal tells parents an after-school academic program has to be canceled because the funds used to pay the teachers have run out.

When asked about the email, Witt told News5 to cut the cameras. We did not agree to the request and kept rolling.
— Read on www.koaa.com/news/covering-colorado/school-superintendent-tries-to-cut-interview-short-after-questioned-about-program-funding

Letter to the board

A letter sent to the WPSD board recently by a community member:

Dear BOE Directors:

I cannot express the anger and disappointment that I am feeling as a result of the announcement regarding the middle school last Friday. After the turmoil over the past two years, and recent election in which the results were very close, I had hoped that the incumbent directors would be a little more willing to solicit input from, and to listen to, staff, parents, and students. Clearly that was wishful thinking.

Over 30 years ago, the taxpayers of this community approved a bond issue to build a new school so that 6-8 grades would have their own space away from high school students. For 29 years, the Woodland Park Middle School was that space, and then a new school board was elected. The middle school has been a place for 6-8 graders to transition from elementary school and get ready for high school. The middle school grades are unique because of the massive changes that kids go through at this age; they aren’t little kids anymore, and they aren’t teens and young adults. The middle school is a place for these kids to not only learn academics, but to experience greater choice of electives than elementary and start to develop their own interests, to join sports’ teams, academic teams, and Forensics, and to have a safe place in which to grow that belongs to them.

Starting last year, the middle school students started to lose their space. The middle school was being, “under utilized.” There weren’t 30 kids in every classroom. When Merit Academy was given half of the middle school building, the middle school students lost a large part of their space. The middle school staff went on educating middle school students and working to make sure that all students were welcomed into the safe space of the middle school. Then the decision came, despite parental and staff input to the contrary, to move 6th grade out of the middle school that was built, in part, for them. It was stated that the middle school was over-crowded (funny, since a year prior it was, “almost empty”). Parents, staff, community, etc. were told that it was so much better for the 6th grade to be in the elementary schools away from the older middle school students. A BOE director gushed over the, “opportunities,” that Superintendent Witt had created for the 6th grade students at the elementaries. Did you ever consider the opportunities that were stripped from them? In the middle school, 6th grade band students have band five days a week. Art, P.E., Consumer and Family Studies, Choir, STEM classes meet five days a week. They have all academic classes five days a week. In the elementary, they are lucky to have electives two or maybe three days a week. Thanks to the middle school band teacher now having to travel three days a week, 6th grade students get one day of band weekly, which will have a negative impact on the future of the WPSD band program. In the elementary school, science and social studies are not taught every day. 6th grade students no longer are able to join the Forensics team like they have for years, and just when 6th grade students were being added to all middle school sports teams, they get moved out and lose the opportunity.

Now the 7th and 8th graders are losing their entire building. If it wasn’t good for 6th graders to be with the older 7th and 8th graders, how is it good for the 7th and 8th graders to be with juniors and seniors? What considerations have been made regarding this move? The middle school PE program just received equipment to upgrade their fitness room. Where will that new equipment go in the high school building so that the 7th and 8th grade students will be able to utilize it? Will the middle school students really have their own safe space in the high school? Will they still have their beloved teachers and administrators? What about classroom space and storage space? Is there really adequate space in the high school? The high school building has numerous problems due to its age. Will all available space be safe for students? And what about sports programs? At this time, there are 7-8 basketball teams, and depending on numbers, could be as many as 9, practicing and playing games. Middle school practices daily in the middle school gym (with new bleachers that have WP). They play games on Mondays and Wednesdays. High school teams practice in both the North gym and main gym and play games usually on Tuesdays and Thursdays in both gyms. The high school boys and girls, as they have done for decades, already alternate early and late practices. Can you explain how this will work when middle school teams are added in the mix? How are up to 9 teams going to practice and play games in two gyms?! The same goes for the fall with volleyball. The cheer team has to practice after volleyball practices, and in between basketball early and late practices. Baseball has started their preseason practices, and the cheer team now has to shorten their time because the baseball team needs the space. During track season, middle school practices on the middle school track. Will they still be using the middle school track when they are housed in the high school? If so, will the district be bussing them each afternoon to the middle school? What kind of costs will be incurred in order to provide for middle school and high school teams.? Can you explain how this is even fair to WPMS and WPHS students and athletes? Can you explain how it’s ok for Merit to have 10 kids in a class, but when the middle school only had 25 kids in classes, it wasn’t enough?

For the past two plus years, it has appeared that, although the BOE is the board of WPSD, it has done everything in its power to benefit Merit Academy at the expense of WPSD schools, particularly WPMS. Now, please understand that I am all for school choice; I’m in support of having a charter school. But I am not in support of how the BOE has worked to destroy WPMS. Most charter schools are not given a building that is already in use, and then push out the students that are using that building. What has been done is wrong. It is decisions like this, without thought, without staff, parent, student, and community input or support, that continue to create strife. It is also decisions like this that continue to put Merit Academy at odds with WPSD parents, students, and staff; not because of Merit, but because of the actions of the WPSD BOE.

With sadness,

Laurie Gutierrez
Community member, taxpayer, former WPSD student, former WPSD staff member

WP cuts middle school after school academic assistance program

The Woodland Park school board found the money to give superintendent Ken Witt a $15k raise (plus 5% annual raise and up to 15% bonus), and found $328,000 extra to give to their pet project, Merit Academy, but followed up by CUTTING an after school academic assistance program at the middle school. As is typical for the Woodland Park school district, details are scarce…we’ll post an update as we learn more.

UPDATE – another email was sent out as a followup with new information. CORA request has been submitted to see if there’s any paper trail that would shed some light on this. The new email said:

Hello WPMS Families–

Earlier today I sent out a notification concerning the status of our Afterschool Academic Assistance program.  Unfortunately that email went out prematurely, and I did not have all the relevant information.  I apologize for any confusion, distress, or inconvenience that caused.

We are NOT cancelling our Afterschool Academic Assistance offering.  We will continue to offer this to students on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 3:20pm to 4:20pm.  In the event we need to cancel a particular day due to weather or other unforeseen circumstances, we will communicate that on the day of as needed.

Again, I apologize for any inconvenience this caused our community.

Thank you,

Bill Phalen

The original email:

Dissenting opinion on school board decision | Guest column

A guest column in the Courier, written by our newest school board member Keegan Barkley:

It is 4 a.m. Thursday, Jan. 18 and I am wide awake. My conscience allowed me to fall asleep easily but my frustration woke me early. Superintendent Ken Witt’s contract was extended last night by a 3-2 vote in what, in my opinion, was a confusing and disorganized special board meeting. I feel it is my duty to the community to explain my dissenting vote. 

Nothing about this contract renewal followed best practices or ensured it was in the best interest of district families, teachers, and taxpayers. As a specialist in talent acquisition, I work with employee contracts daily. Contract renewals are negotiations that include honest conversations with the hiring manager, finance department, and human resources. Contract renewals require objective performance reviews. Contract renewals usually consider feedback from someone’s peers and subordinates. None of that happened last night.

In fact, the opposite happened. Because of the way the agenda was written, we were not legally allowed to negotiate Mr. Witt’s proposed contract while in executive session. We were not legally allowed to discuss the performance of the employee or the petition against the renewal signed by over 300 parents and community members, and we were not legally allowed to propose any changes to the contract. Our only options were to postpone the vote or to vote that evening.

Despite the fact we, as a Board, had only minutes ago received the contract, and the current contract is not up until June 3, board members chose to legally bind our school district and all the taxpayers who support it, to a 2-year contract extension. A contract with guaranteed salary increases each year when we do not offer the same to our teachers. 

We had the opportunity to start mending the cracks that have formed in our community – to do our due diligence in examining what our district needs to move forward successfully. To show the community who elected us that we can rise above our differences by undertaking a robust, objective examination of our superintendent’s contract and performance. Instead, another contract was rubber stamped with no consideration for the ramifications on the families who depend on us to think critically, not politically. 

This approach is irresponsible. It is not fiscally conservative or transparent, and it is not in the best interest of this district or our community. 

Board policy states the board shall:

1. Represent and govern the district by determining and verifying district/superintendent performance.

2. Ensure input from students, staff, parents and other citizens as a means to link to the entire community.

3. Develop and modify as needed written governing policies.

4. Ensure superintendent performance through monitoring District Purpose Statement and executive expectations policies.

5. Ensure board performance through monitoring governance process and board/superintendent staff relationship policies.

I will adhere to my duties, and I thank the other board member willing to put in the effort last night.

Keegan Barkley