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What's on my mind this week: Accountability journalism is slow. You file the request, you wait, you push back on the fee, you narrow the scope, you wait again. And then the documents arrive, and you find out whether the story is what you thought it was, or something else entirely.

This week, I got the Jeffco records I've been waiting for since March 9. The district promised its Budget Reduction Blueprint would cut central administration before cutting classrooms. I asked for the documents that would prove it. You'll find what I found at the top of this week's issue.

Below that: Adams 12 is closer to school closures than many families may realize, Westminster's substitute shortage is worse than the district has let on, and I'm starting to dig into something that's been landing in my inbox for weeks — the state of heating and cooling in older Jeffco buildings.

Let's get into it.

When Jeffco Public Schools announced its most prominent central office cut under the Budget Reduction Blueprint — the elimination of the deputy superintendent — it characterized the move as a "nearly 10% leadership reduction."

Internal planning documents I obtained this week through a public records request tell a different story: both positions cut from district leadership, the deputy superintendent and an executive assistant, were already vacant. No one actively working in a leadership role lost a job. Meanwhile, the security department is adding two positions and increasing its budget.

That finding sits at the center of a broader question the district has never directly answered: when Superintendent Tracy Dorland promised Budget Reduction Blueprint cuts would fall "as far from students as possible," did they?

What the documents show

The records break down cuts department by department, in dollar and staffing terms.

The nine core administrative departments — district leadership, human resources, communications, finance, legal, IT and others — are planning combined budget reductions of roughly $8.8 million. But that figure understates the picture.

The district also runs teaching, learning and student support departments from the central office and those cuts are harder to categorize. The district counts them as central reductions; parents and teachers experience them as school-level losses.

A separate document shows the district plans to cut 199 salaried positions across its 145 schools, including 136 teachers, more than 10 counselors, nearly eight social-emotional learning specialists and more than five social workers and school psychologists. Schools will also lose the equivalent of 494 hours of hourly staff, primarily paraprofessionals. The district has told the public it is cutting $14 million from school budgets. It has never said, in comparable terms, how much it’s cutting from central administration.

A board member asked the same question

At the March 12 board meeting, Director Tina Moenian challenged the Blueprint on the record. "The last thing that I want to feel in this situation is that I'm expected to rubber stamp this budget that I have concerns about," she said.

She asked for a school-by-school breakdown of where cuts are falling, a clear accounting of how much came from central office versus schools, and alternative budget options that would shift more cuts away from classrooms. Directors Gibbins and Echeverria echoed her.

Between the lines

Jeffco's fiscal crisis is real — enrollment is down more than 4,000 students, and the state is chronically short on K-12 funding. But the district also spent four years growing central administration by roughly 40% while enrollment fell 5%. The Blueprint has never answered whether the response to that growth is proportionate.

The people who showed up to board meetings this winter understood the stakes personally. Audra, a licensed preschool educator and Jeffco parent, described watching a traumatized child transform over the course of a year with mental health support — then told the board her school is losing one of its mental health providers. A teacher at Rose Stein International said her school faced an impossible choice: the school counselor or two fifth-grade teachers.

Those decisions are playing out across 145 schools right now. The full story is coming.

Adams 12 Five Star Schools has been studying which schools to close or consolidate since last June. Superintendent Chris Gdowski told me this week the district plans to bring closure recommendations to the school board in late September, with a board vote expected before early November.

No schools have been named. Gdowski said the list has shifted repeatedly as staff weigh factors including where students would go, transportation, building quality and the location of programs like preschool and special education. He expects to have recommendations narrowed down by late summer.

What triggered the urgency

The district projected it would lose about 450 students between October 2024 and October 2025. It actually lost 1,365 — a gap of roughly 900 kids.

Gdowski attributed part of that to families leaving due to federal immigration policy changes, and the rest to a longer-term pattern of families having fewer children and moving to lower-cost housing markets. The district is now projecting it will lose another 800 students next school year.

Fewer students means less state funding, and state funding follows the child. The district is already operating elementary schools with two classrooms per grade level — sometimes one. Gdowski said three classrooms per grade level is the floor for what the district considers a thriving school. Many buildings are already below it.

Why the timing is deliberate

The March announcement that the district was "evaluating consolidations" was intentionally vague — and intentionally early. Gdowski said some districts announce closures two years out and watch families and staff quietly exit before the decision is final. Adams 12 is trying a different approach: give enough notice to avoid blindsiding anyone, but not so much lead time that it destabilizes schools that are still open.

What's next

One more thing worth knowing: the 2024 bond promised improvements at every school in the district. I asked Gdowski directly how the district weighs bond-funded renovations against buildings that may be on the closure list. I'll have his full answer — and the rest of this story — in an upcoming article.

📌 Weapon arrest at Chatfield High School. A 16-year-old Chatfield High School student was arrested March 31 after bringing a butcher knife to school with plans to harm a teacher, according to the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office. The student attended the teacher's class with a concealed knife but did not act. The student then went to the school office, asked for a counselor and disclosed the plan. The student was booked into Marvin W. Foote Youth Services Center on a weapons charge. Additional charges may follow.

📌 Westminster's substitute shortage is worse than it looks. District records I obtained show 14 teaching positions went without permanent teachers from the first day of school through at least late February, 3,823 substitute assignments in 147 school days. When the pool runs short, the district pulls English learner and special education specialists to cover general education classrooms. Their own students don't receive services when that happens. Read the full story →

📌 Jeffco's federal civil rights case: The deadline isn't what was reported. Jeffco provided me with its March 20 letter to the Office for Civil Rights. It formally acknowledges the federal findings but does not agree to the proposed resolution — and notes that "your letter mentioned no deadline for response." The 10-day deadline every outlet reported, including me, came from OCR's press release, not the legal document.

Fox News reported Jeffco had committed to reversing its policies. A district spokesperson says that’s not accurate. My follow-up, including a significant finding about the CHSAA bylaw that the federal government's evidence relied on, is coming this week.

📌 27J has built 15 schools since 2001 — and the growth that filled them is now forcing a boundary redraw. A look at how one of Colorado's fastest-expanding districts planned for growth, what the math looks like now with Rocky Vista High School under construction, and why the boundary decisions being debated today will likely need to be redrawn again. Read the full story →

Digging into the condition of Jeffco's older school buildings

After my March 18 story on Jeffco's building repair fund running dry, readers started filling my inbox. Teachers described classrooms reaching 80-plus degrees while AC systems remained inactive. Custodians working in 90-degree buildings all summer. HVAC systems so broken that fixing one room means freezing another. Roof leaks. Lead in water fountains.

The Jeffco Education Support Professionals Association, which represents custodial staff, confirmed the conditions are real.

So I filed CORA requests. I asked Jeffco for three things at two schools where readers had flagged concerns. For each school, I requested the most recent facility condition assessment, all ADA compliance audits since 2015 and all open or unresolved maintenance work orders as of the date of the request.

Those requests are pending. When the records come in, I'll tell you what the district's own documents say about the condition of those buildings — and whether the problems readers are describing show up in the paperwork. If you work or have a child in an older Jeffco building and have noticed issues, I want to hear from you.

📍 What Jeffco's building records actually show. I've filed CORA requests at two elementary schools for facility condition assessments, ADA compliance audits and open maintenance work orders. When the records arrive, I'll have a school-by-school look at what the district's own documents say about building conditions and whether what readers are describing matches what's on paper.

📍 Jeffco's concurrent enrollment promise. The district has marketed concurrent enrollment — college courses taken for free while still in high school — as an equity opportunity available to all students. I'm examining whether access to those courses is actually equitable across schools and student populations.

Class Notes is free because readers like you share it with people who need it. When you refer friends, you unlock tools I've built from covering five Front Range school districts:

🔓 3 referrals — CORA Request Template Kit (fill-in-the-blank public records requests)

Need to speak at a board meeting? Get "How to Give Public Comment That Gets Heard" →

I can't be everywhere, but you are. If something's happening in your district or school that doesn't add up, I want to hear about it. A policy that makes no sense. A budget line that vanished. A question no one will answer.

You can stay anonymous. I protect my sources.

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