A lot has changed at the Ricardo Flores Magon Academy, a local charter school whose stellar test scores belied the tense environment that characterized the school when we wrote about it in November 2011. In March 2012, the founder of the school — and the man who teachers and parents…
Vape pens used to smoke marijuana aren’t new: We wrote about a dispensary giving them away to chemotherapy patients back in 2012. But with the growing popularity of e-cigarettes, the concept has gone mainstream in a big way thanks to the way the devices mask much of the scent and…
We’re all familiar with how quickly small matters can become national controversies these days — and the twists, turns and craziness around a Fort Collins High School spirit week proposal for what was originally called “‘Merica Day” is a case in point. The school initially rejected the idea for a…
On January 29, the Colorado Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a case to determine who will fill the District 4 seat on the Adams 12 school board. As we reported in an earlier blog post, the question before the high court is whether candidate Amy Speers won the…
Last month, CU professor Patti Adler was called on the carpet over a prostitution skit that’s long been part of a class entitled “Deviance in U.S. Society,” with Adler supporters blasting the university for what they saw as attacks on academic freedom and Adler personally. In the end, the administration…
Earlier this week, we told you about controversy over CU-Boulder professor Patti Adler, who implied to students that she was being forced out at the university over a prostitution skit she included in her class entitled “Deviance in U.S. Society.” Since that post, and in the face of social-media protests…
Auraria has long been known as a sort of safe haven for the homeless in Denver. It’s a great place to get out of the wind, grab a half-smoked cigarette or two and maybe, just maybe, snag a chance to use a bathroom and get a break from your harsh…
Patti Adler is a longtime professor at CU-Boulder. But whether she’ll continue at the school is unclear at this writing due to complaints over a prostitution skit included in her “Deviance in U.S. Society” class. Not since CU-Boulder’s long-running (and ultimately successful) effort to fire controversial professor Ward Churchill has…
Jade Masters-Ownbey, mom of the little Canon City girl who six-year-old Hunter Yelton was suspended for kissing a few days back, initially said she wouldn’t talk with the media. She thought the international publicity given to the story as a result of Hunter’s behavior being tagged sexual harassment was way…
No denying that Canon City six-year-old Hunter Yelton is a charmer. But charm didn’t get him out of trouble this week, and may have actually gotten him into it. That’s because he was suspended after kissing a classmate on the hand — an act the boy’s school branded sexual harassment…
The Colorado Supreme Court is poised to play a role in determining who sits on the Adams 12 school board. The state’s high court has decided to hear a case that seeks an answer to a complicated question: Can candidate Amy Speers, whose story we told last week, officially win…
What happens when an ineligible candidate wins an election with two-thirds of the vote? That’s the situation Amy Speers finds herself in. A candidate for the Adams 12 Five Star school board, Speers was declared ineligible a week before election day when district officials realized she didn’t live in the…
We’re guessing most parents of students at Pueblo South High School assumed that teacher Larisa Oringdulph committed a crime when sending a nude photo of herself to a student. Turns out they were wrong. And while Oringdulph has resigned her position, she’s technically able to get a job at another…
For the first time, the Colorado Department of Education has broken out marijuana from student expulsion figures related to drugs — and during the most recent school year, pot was by far the leading reason for pupils being expelled. This information is concerning to two experts with whom we communicated…
The four candidates supportive of Denver Public Schools’ brand of education reform swept the school board election yesterday. Barbara O’Brien, Rosemary Rodriguez, Mike Johnson and Landri Taylor will fill the four open slots on a seven-member board that has been characterized by clashes between its reform-minded majority and a vocal…
A second round of campaign finance reports filed in the Denver Public Schools school board election reveals a familiar pattern: the four so-called reform candidates continue to raise the most money, thanks to donations from high-profile reformers, such as Texas billionaires John and Laura Arnold, while the four non-reform candidates…
If there’s area of life in which teenagers excel, it’s mobile technology. But they may not be as adept at navigating the thorny world of sex, which includes talking with parents, using contraceptives and making responsible decisions regarding sexual health. Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains is addressing this disconnect…
Update: At least two of the nine Denver Public Schools Board of Education candidates — Michael Kiley and Meg Schomp — voluntarily disclosed all campaign contributions over $100 by midnight on October 25, fulfilling a request from a coalition of organizations that includes the Denver teachers union, which has endorsed…
Outgoing Denver Public Schools board member Andrea Merida, once an active member of the Democratic party in Denver, is now co-chair of the 1,800-member Denver Green Party. And in that capacity, Merida, seen here, is speaking out on two ballot measures: Proposition AA and Referred Question 2A. Both deal with…
Parents (and kids) opposed to standardized testing took their fight to the streets this past weekend during the annual Zombie Crawl. With bloody pencils protruding from their skulls, kids held signs with messages such as, “Testing Kills Brains.” “Standardized testing is actually harmful for our children,” says Amber Olson, a…
Like much of the rhetoric surrounding next month’s Denver Public Schools school board election, the nine candidates are roughly split when it comes to who’s funding their campaigns. The four so-called reform candidates have received big checks from Phil Anschutz, Daniel Ritchie and DaVita CEO Kent Thiry and his wife…
Denver Public Schools is projecting that it will once again be the largest school district in Colorado, a title it hasn’t held since the 1970s. With an estimated 88,208 students enrolled this year, up from 72,188 students ten years ago, DPS calls itself the “fastest-growing urban school district in the…
