February 20, 2001
Boulder Daily Camera
by Amy Bounds
Chris Howard's daughter, Ashley, was in fourth grade when Howard realized something was missing from her highly motivated child's education in the Boulder Valley School District.
Six years later, Howard has helped start two of the district's five charter schools — Summit Middle School and Peak to Peak — and is also a Colorado League of Charter School board member.
"There are as many different philosophies in charter schools as people can imagine," she said. "But it's all people who are looking for a choice. It's a group of community leaders or educators or parents who have a vision."
Boulder Valley also counts Horizons K-8 Alternative School, Boulder Preparatory High School and Sojourner School among its charter schools. Each has a distinct mission and educational philosophy.
Founders describe Summit, Boulder Valley's first charter school, as a reaction to the district's switch to the middle school concept. A number of parents saw the change as de-emphasizing academics and focusing on "touchy-feely" programs instead of getting kids to learn the basics.
When a group of parents failed to convince district officials to start middle school honors courses, they started the academically rigorous Summit.
"It just evolved from there," Howard said.
She's now on the board of Peak to Peak, which opened this fall as a K-5 school and is adding grades six through 12.
She said the school both meets the demand for more middle schools like Summit and offers a college-preparatory program K-12.
"There is choice in the district, but there was more demand for the spots than could be filled," Howard said.
Stan Garnett, Boulder Valley school board president, attributes the district's charter school growth in the five years since Summit opened to both the middle school switch and a large number of highly educated, involved parents living in the district.
"Many people have time to be involved in the effort it takes to form a charter school," he said.
Altogether, the 79 charter schools operating in Colorado serve 20,155 children, or a little less than 3 percent of the state's student population.
Some rural schools have converted to charter status to maintain control when the school district's headquarters are miles away. Then there's a charter in Aurora opening next year to relieve overcrowding.
Most, however, are started by parents or teachers who want to try a different kind of school.
"It's providing new opportunities for populations that haven't been served," said Colorado League of Charter Schools director Jim Griffin. "You couldn't have a better laboratory to try new education reforms. There's considerable demand for different curriculum models."
Colorado charter schools include a program for pregnant teens in Montrose, experiential music and arts classes in Pueblo and special curricula for gifted and at-risk students in Denver.
In Boulder Valley, Horizons initially was a district focus school that converted to charter school status to continue with its small class sizes, multi-age classrooms and practice of requiring teachers to cover all subject areas.
"It gave us more flexibility," said Ann Kane, the school's lead teacher.
Sojourner, on the other hand, is a small, experiential school started by former middle school teachers frustrated that the district pulled the plug on the middle school model before it really started to work.
"We try to work with the middle school students based on their interests," said Sojourner Principal Richard Garcia.
"The word that I'm getting is that kids are loving it."
Boulder Preparatory High School was started as a year-round school to serve youth involved in the court system. The schools program provides instruction through a block system and allows a student to complete high school requirements within two and a half years.
"People in the Boulder justice system saw a lot of students out of school for one reason or another," said Boulder Prep headmaster Bruce Blodgett. "The one piece missing was their education. It's way to get these kids into the mainstream. They're always welcome back to us to finish high school, no matter what."
Though Boulder Valley charter schools vary widely, the most common model used in Colorado charters is E.D. Hirch's Core Knowledge series. Core Knowledge lays out, grade-by-grade, what students should learn in each subject.
Last school year, about half the state's charter school enrollment was in 26 Core Knowledge schools.
In Boulder Valley, Peak to Peak is the first charter to use the back-to-basics approach.
"Core Knowledge is a nationally known program that's been highly successful in a variety of communities," Howard said. "The parents and the teachers know exactly what's being taught every year. It builds on itself. It's very rich in content."
Another local charter school using Core Knowledge is Longmont's K-8 Twin Peaks Charter Academy.
St. Vrain Valley school board member Jim Martinsen said Core Knowledge's popularity helped spur parents to propose Twin Peaks.
"There are just a bunch of people out there who think Core Knowledge is the way to go," he said.
Parent Joe Wilson, whose daughter has attended the school since it opened in 1997, said the main reason for starting a charter school in St. Vrain Valley was dissatisfaction with the academic rigor at district schools.
"They weren't teaching the kids what they needed to know," he said. "Core Knowledge gives kids a good foundation. That large knowledge base lets them build on what they know."
Wilson and other Twin Peaks parents also started St. Vrain Valley's second charter school, the college-prep Ute Creek Secondary Academy, as a continuation of the back-to-basics Twin Peaks.
Because the Core Knowledge series only goes through middle school, Ute Creek uses the James Madison series, which is similar to Core Knowledge, and the Modern Red Schoolhouse reform model.
Modern Red requires schools to write their own academic standards, develop benchmarks and create individual learning plans for each student.
Ute Creek is the only high school in the state fully implementing the Modern Red design and the only stand-alone charter high school not targeted to serve a specific population, such as at-risk students. Most charter schools serving the general, high school student population are K-12.
"There are schools now that are basing their charter applications on ours," said Ute Creek vice president Debra Kansgen. "It seems to be exactly what our students need."