Dear DPS Community,
In DPS, our collective responsibility is educational equity — our focus is on accelerating the trajectory of our most historically marginalized students and creating student, adult and system experiences where Every Learner Thrives.
In 2016, Dr. Sharon Bailey published “The Bailey Report”, which detailed the opportunities and barriers facing our Black and African American students and team members. In 2022, we commissioned a research report to understand the opportunities and barriers facing our Latino students, families and employees.
We hired the Multicultural Leadership Center to create “La Raza Report”. The four lead researchers are long-time friends of DPS, having been involved with our district for the last few decades. Members of the team have assisted with the creation of multicultural studies curricula for DPS, helped develop our bilingual and multilingual education program, led the previous Hispanic Education Advisory Council, and assisted with the Colorado Legislature’s HB19-1192 Multicultural Studies in K-12 bill. Two of them served on my Superintendent Transition Team during the first few months of my arrival.
Today, we are excited for the researchers to share their findings and recommendations through “La Raza Report”. The research identified several important themes, such as the importance of culturally responsive curricula, enhancing school resources, tackling safety issues and bullying, managing cultural dissonance and language challenges, promoting Latino leadership, incorporating Latino culture in education and boosting parental engagement.
The findings and recommendations based on the focus groups, surveys and research compiled as a result of the report provide invaluable insight and information for us as a district to capitalize on the opportunities and mitigate the barriers to improve our Latino community's academic, personal and professional experiences. We are committed to taking significant steps towards improvement. This year, we will establish a Latinx Student Success team to address the recommendations of the report — a counterpart to our newly formed Black Student Success team. The Latinx Student Success team’s primary focus is to implement the recommendations that will accelerate the trajectory and remove barriers for our Latino students, families and employees. In addition, last year, we formed the Latine Education Advisory Council, which is community-driven and led, again focusing on the Latino experience in DPS.
We will be sharing updates on progress at dpsk12.org/laraza. I am incredibly grateful to everyone who participated in this research project. A special thank you to the Multicultural Leadership Center research team for their remarkable work. I am looking forward to what the future holds, so we can create effective and equitable educational opportunities for Latino students, families, employees and community members.
In collaboration,
Dr. Alex Marrero
Superintendent