DAVIS: The Small Colorado Town at the Center of Far-Right Plans for American Schools

One thing is already clear: what is happening in Woodland Park is not an organic political movement. At every turn, it has ties to deep pockets and long-term ideological projects. It may have been the voters of Teller County who elected the ideological school board at the heart of the matter, but it’s not the voters of Teller County formulating and executing a legal strategy to consume the public school system from within and transform it into something unrecognizable. Someone else is doing that.

But who? And why Woodland Park? 
— Read on coloradotimesrecorder.com/2023/06/davis-the-small-colorado-town-at-the-center-of-far-right-plans-for-american-schools/53934/

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).

How to email your board members and superintendent (how to avoid email censoring)

The WPSD board and superintendent have put limits on freedom of speech for voters in this district. If a voter wants to speak up at a public board meeting, they may or may not get a chance, as total public comment period is limited to 30 minutes max, and names are drawn at random. If someone doesn’t get selected they’re encouraged to email the board instead, but did you know the board applies a filter to incoming emails? If your email contains one of the ‘Blocked Words’, it will be bounced back to you and the board will never see it (same goes for emails to the superintendent.

If you’d like to call Witt a ‘turd’, well, that’s not allowed. Want to call Illingworth a ‘prick’? Not allowed. All sorts of classic mild profanity is included in the list, which thanks to CORA, the public can now peruse…click ‘more’ to see the list at the end of this post (unlike them, I DO believe in freedom of speech).

Read more: How to email your board members and superintendent (how to avoid email censoring) Continue reading →

6/4/2023 Weekly Update

Last Week:

  • School’s out for summer! 😀
  • This was a quiet week, with the focus on wrapping up the school year. The only thing I reported on was the teacher appreciation bags at two of the schools…not just the quantity, but that the district took down a post from the High School’s Facebook page showing the large number of bags there.
  • I’m seeing an increase in the number of letters to the editor at the Courier that parrot the same pro-board talking points. I dove into one here, fact checking what I could.

Here’s what’s coming up this week:

  • The district is officially on spring break, but we expect some activity this month on a few fronts. First, the preliminary budget needs to be presented and discussed, in the June 14 board meeting. As part of that, we’ll be hearing the board’s plans detailed for improved security, including $1 million from the reserve fund to be spent on one-time infrastructure improvements, and money to be spent on security personnel in our schools (presumably, but not confirmed, to be through Sheriff Mikesell’s private security company).
  • In the budget overview last month, the district predicts per-pupil funding to increase about 11%, and district enrollment to remain flat. Given these numbers and the increased revenue it suggests, will the board be giving teachers a raise? They made (and continue to make) a really big deal last year about using extra revenue to give teachers a raise so it’d be odd for them to not once again take advantage of this opportunity, especially considering the large numbers of staff leaving the district.

District takes down Facebook post about Teacher Appreciation Bags

There’s a tradition in the schools, at the end of the school year, teachers not returning the next year are given Teacher Appreciation Bags. What’s made this year different is the large number of staff choosing to leave the district, with the reason cited typically being this board and superintendent. The WPHS posted a picture of the teacher appreciation bags to their Facebook page last Thursday, as shown below:

That post has now been taken down from their page. No reason was given, but I suspect it’s because this image helps make clear just how many staff are leaving the district (this picture shows 22 teacher appreciation bags, though some other teachers have already left in the past few months so are not represented here).

Gateway Elementary had an even larger sign of internal trouble, with twenty seven bags:

I’m working to get some exact numbers for how many staff are leaving; please be patient as I want solid documentation to back up the numbers and that takes time. You can expect me to publish a list in the second half of June, though there may be some additions as the summer goes on so the final tally would be August, before the new school year starts.

Parents almost universally loved our teachers here, and it’s a real shame to see so many driven away by this board and superintendent. There is no way this will not disrupt the learning environment this fall…best case scenario is a large number of new teachers that need to be integrated into WPSD; worst case is a potential failure to fill open positions, which I imagine would be addressed by increasing class size or, in the case of high school electives, eliminating those classes altogether.

Fact check – Letters to the Editor

The amount of disinformation being published in the Courier is disturbing…and I’m not sure how best to counter that. For now, I’ll just use this blog to address some of what I’m reading. First there was David Illingworth’s letter to the editor (see my review here). This time, it’s Aaron Helstrom, one of the District Accountability Committee members hand-picked by this board last fall, writing his own Letter to the Editor. I’ll pick some of his comments to review, and include his entire letter at the end here.

The article also makes it seem as if the school board is pulling all mental health funding. Fortunately, in a recent interview, School Board Member David Illingworth mentioned the rejected grants had conditions attached that went against the school’s standards and parent’s desires for their children.

In ’22-23, the district received 30 grants; they’ve applied for only a few for ’23-24. The board has never given any examples of any conditions attached to any specific grants to explain the reason not to pursue them again.

…has slowly been adapting a new, and superior, set of standards, which they have been forthright in discussing publicly.

The board never discussed the American Birthright standard, they adopted it with little public input and the public only had about one day advanced notice due to my seeking clarification of a board agenda item.

They also omitted the fact that parents and others were offered the gymnasium as an overflow room (which they did not accept).

We were never offered the gymnasium. We were told we could seek shelter in the Commons Area. Those wishing to participate in public comment needed to stay close to the doors, in the rain, to see if their name was called.

…the board granted teachers the biggest pay raise in the district’s history

Yes, per-pupil funding and sales tax revenue have greatly increased the budget allowing for this, that has nothing to do with the board and it remains to be seen if this was a sustainable move. For example, per pupil funding next year is increasing about 8%; will the board pass along that increase to teachers in the form of another raise?

has helped to offer transportation services to students to attend classes

The board has extended transportation services to Merit Academy, without asking them to pay their fair share.

They have approved funding for meal services so any student in the district who needs a free meal is able to get one

The funding comes from the state, via the free lunch program funded by Proposition FF. The board did not approve funding. The board and superintendent vocally opposed this program, until presumably public opposition made them change their mind.

The board also started the first charter school in the district, giving parents greater choice.

Merit Academy was started by Ken Witt and Brad Miller, under the umbrella of ERBOCES in the ’21-22 school year. The board did not start the charter school, the transferred Merit from ERBOCES to WPSD.

Most notable, for the first time in over a decade, enrollment grew by an astounding 15%, placing Woodland Park district in the Top Five for student growth in Colorado.

This ignores the massive decrease in the district with Merit opened up under ERBOCES. If you count those students as always being in WPSD, the actual increase is around 3%. Considering the COVID trends of people moving to rural areas, it’s impossible to assign credit for that increase to any one factor. Read more here.

Continue reading →

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.

RN and special education staffing levels

I’ve learned that both of the nurses in our district are leaving at the end of the year, yet there is only one job opening posted. Perhaps the district will post a second opening eventually, but this is concerning, as five schools would be a lot for only one RN to handle. Note that each school DOES have its own full time health aide and it’s expected those will be kept. But having only one RN would be too much, especially when it comes to immunization compliance and health screenings. Again, they may yet post a second position…but this is something parents should watch.

The other bit of news concerns our special education program. Insiders say that those staff levels are being severely decimated by staff leaving the district after this year, with some special education programs losing all staff, reportedly because of this board and superintendent. The question is, will the district be able to attract new employees to fill those positions? We can and must do better than this, especially for these most vulnerable children.

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