Denver Public Schools mulling changes to enrollment boundaries, zones

Last year, the Denver school board passed a policy directing the superintendent to review and adjust enrollment boundaries and zones for the 2027-28 school year and continue to reevaluate them every five years after.

If you're already asking yourself what an enrollment boundary vs. an enrollment zone is, that gives you an indication that the potential changes impacting DPS families is a complicated one. 

Denver's school board felt it was time.

"Our boundary system was first drawn in the 1990s," explained Andrew Huber, DPS's executive director of enrollment and campus planning.

Since then, the city has seen density increase in some communities, while enrollment has declined in other areas.  

"There hasn't been a kind of holistic update to those boundaries and to that boundary and zone infrastructure since then," said Huber.

To lay it out: some Denver residents live in an enrollment boundary, meaning their children automatically have a guaranteed spot at one school without having to "choice in." 

But other Denver residents live in an enrollment zone, guaranteeing students a spot at one of several schools in that zone. Families in enrollment zones are required to complete a SchoolChoice application to enroll. 

On top of that, any student in Colorado can "choice in" to any other school in the state if there's room in that school. 

Now, DPS is looking at making changes to the system at all grades and in all six regions of the district.

Guarantees made by boundaries and zones will shift for next school year. Exactly how is still to be determined, but we do know parents won't have to reapply every year.

"The intent is not to displace anybody from the school that they're enrolled in right now," Huber explained. "Once you have a seat in a school, you stay in that school."

Parents who must submit a SchoolChoice application will only need to do so during a point of transition - kindergarten, 6th grade, and 9th grade. And proximity will play a role. 

"Students who are living in that proximity zone, they get elevated choice priority into that school, which retains the ability for a school to operate as a neighborhood school." 

The superintendent will present his decisions to the school board on Oct. 26. Until then, the district is continuing to hold community meetings to collect feedback. 

• Southeast Regional Meeting
• Tuesday, Sept. 8, 6-8 p.m. at Hamilton Middle School
•  Southwest Regional Meeting
• Thursday, Sept. 10, 6-8 p.m. at Abraham Lincoln High School
• Near Northeast Regional Meeting
• Monday, Sept. 14, 6-8 p.m. at Northfield High School
• Northwest Regional Meeting
• Tuesday, Sept. 22, 6-8 p.m. at Career Education Center Early College 
• Central Regional Meeting
• Thursday, Sept. 24, 6-8 p.m. at Bruce Randolph Middle/High School