Teaching Jobs in the Denver Area (Aurora, Columbine: top neighborhood, neighborhoods, school districts)

[leahj224]

I am interested in finding out more about the public school systems in the Denver area. Does anyone have know which school districts are best? (best, meaning safe, good benefits, etc.)

[BenWolfe]

I don't know about benefits, but from a quality of education standpoint on an entire district level Douglas County Schools are typically rated as the best in the state. Of course some schools in Douglas County are better than others and some other areas have outstanding schools. www.dcsdk12.org

Most area around Denver are safe with the exception of several pockets closer into the city. (Yes I do remember Columbine, but that was an isolated incident).

Are you more interested in Elementary, Middle or High School?

[brandilinn1117]

I am also interested in perhaps teaching in this area. Thanks for your post, I will keep my eye out for what people say. So far, I have been collecting and printing tons of ifo from the district websites themselves and from greatschools.com. The easiest thing to do is compare the high schools with in a county, it gives them ratings. This is a pretty good indicator, maybe. I guess I will find out soon. I am looking for something in the North and West side

[leahj224]

I am certified in English 7-12, so I could teach in middle or high school. However, most of my experience has been at the middle school level. Can't help it--I like the teenage angst years.

[BlueWillowPlate]

There is a special spot in heaven for all middle school teachers.
Both my sons went through Denver Public Schools (and I graduated from East High many years ago) so I have some knowledge of DPS.
Some schools are rougher than others, but most of the faculty is sincere and outstanding.
One of my boys went to Place Middle School, which used to have a challenge (gifted/talented) program, I don't know if it still does. My other son went to Hill Middle School and was in their more rigorous program; my nephew is at Morey and his parents have been happy with it.
We were never thrilled about the No Child Left Behind Act. Our kids tested fine, that wasn't the problem, but I do think that a lot of schools are now teaching to the test and it takes away valuable time which could be spent on other activities.
Greatschools website does give you some idea of what to expect (I used it when we moved to Florida), but it's good to try to read between the lines of some of the parents' comments. As you teachers know, a school is much more than just a letter grade or a parent's snotty comment.

[leahj224]

Thanks, Cil. I will check out that website. Much appreciated!

[eslteacher]

My boyfriend and I are thinking of moving to Denver. Right now I teach Second Grade in a NYC public school. What are the schools like out there? I am interested in the perspective of both parents and teachers. My masters is in Teaching English as a Second Language, so I am wondering what areas have a large population of immigrants? Also, how is the pay? I have heard something about merit pay in Denver but I am not sure how it works.
What is a good part of the city to live in? Any insight into the area would be so helpful!

[tfox]

Denver has many great neighborhoods -- too many to list here, so I suggest you look at some of the other posts about them. The city of Denver (as opposed to the suburbs) offers everything from high-rise urban living (downtown, Capitol Hill) to estates for the wealthy (Hilltop, Cherry Creek), to middle class housing. And there are some run-down areas and even some dangerous areas but nearly every neighborhood near the city center is improving. Some of the most popular neighborhoods right now in Denver are Washington Park and Highlands, and of course loft-living downtown, but there are dozens of others.

DPS is not considered to be a great school district though my general impression is that it's slowly improving. You may want to look at the site csapscores.org to get some idea of school performance. You will find that some schools in Denver are excellent-performers but most lag behind the suburban areas. Most neighborhoods in Denver are in the process of gentrification but this hasn't (yet) affected the schools too much as most of the gentrifiers don't have kids -- although I predict this will change as I think we're seeing a transition from your first wave of gentrifiers to a second wave. Not that I'm saying that gentrification is all good, but it's pretty unstopable at this point.

Laws in Colorado allow parents to (within certain limitations) send their kids to any school they want to go to without regards to districts. There are also charters and magnets out there that are part of DPS to give more options. So, a lot of Denver students go out of district especially in high school, or to charters. I live in Denver and one of our neighbors' kids went down to Cherry Creek high school in the DTC area, not part of DPS. Since funding is allocated by student enrollment, a lot of Denver high schools are in financial trouble these days as parents and students have voted with their feet. For example, Manual high school recently got closed due to very low enrollment.

Denver isn't an immigration magnet in the same way that Los Angeles or New York is, but we have our share of migration. Naturally, a good number is from Mexico or other Latin countries but there are ethnic groupings from a number of places. The suburb of Aurora, to Denver's east, attracts possibly an even higher number of immigrants that Denver itself does due to cheaper housing. Generally, though, as you head further out into the suburbs, particularly to the south and west, the population becomes less and less diverse.

[BlueWillowPlate]

Tfox gives a very good description of DPS as I knew it.
My younger son went to Hill Middle School in the Hilltop neighborhood, which had quite a few Spanish-speaking migrant kids. I wonder if the Hilltop elementary schools (Carson and Steck) also had/have an influx of migrant children.

[gpraceman]

When you ask about Denver, are you asking about Denver proper? There are lots of places in the city of Denver and around the many surrounding suburbs that are good places to work and live.

Here's a site that may be helpful. It gives a scorecard of each school within a selected district, based on CSAP scores (CO standardized testing). You can also see average salary information by school. For a particular school, you can see the breakdown of school popultation, teacher to student ratio, and so on.

http://cfapp2.rockymountainnews.com/education/index.cfm