Omari Edwards’ love for cooking began at age 8 when he’d help his grandma prepare food to sell, including her famous Bajan fish cakes made with salted cod, herbs and spicy peppers. Now the Greeley West High School senior is pursuing culinary arts, one of the 38 career pathways offered in Greeley-Evans School District 6.
Edwards, a Barbados native, has a paid job in a Banner Health kitchen through a work-based learning program set up by the district. After graduation, he’ll matriculate into the University of Northern Colorado to study nursing, following in his mom’s footsteps. He hopes that nursing, and his current culinary pathway, will lead to a fulfilling, diverse career.
“Being able to express myself through helping others is my path,” Edwards says. “In Barbados, it’s more challenging to get where you want to go. Here, the teachers are integrative, give you a lot of feedback and pump a lot of time into education.”
Schools today offer students flexible menus to design future careers, not only because they may want unusual career paths, but because they also process information differently. Northern Colorado offers a wide variety of educational models tailored to different learning styles. Consider the following schooling options to determine which model meets your child’s needs.
Photo courtesy of Mountain Sage Community School.
Public school
Traditional public schools are free to attend. Schools and facilities are funded by tax dollars, and the curriculum is standardized by the district or state. This model must meet state and federal academic standards set out in the Colorado Measures of Academic Success.
Students in Northern Colorado’s three largest school districts—Poudre School District (PSD) has 30,000+ students, Greeley-Evans School District 6 has 22,000+ students and Thompson School District (TSD) has 15,000+ students—typically have an open enrollment period from Nov. 1 through Dec. 15 each year.
This means students can choose from schools outside their neighborhood boundaries or ones that focus on areas of interest. One example is magnet schools, which center the curriculum around specific subjects such as STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) or STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics).
Other educational choices within the public school system include dual-language immersion programs in English and Spanish, Core Knowledge curriculum, International Baccalaureate programs and more. High school students have the option of concurrent enrollment to earn college credit or pre-employment credentialed certificates.
Districts also offer online education, often with a hybrid model for in-class time. The choice of hybrid or virtual learning offers flexibility for families and teens with jobs as well as students who benefit from one-on-one learning.
“We’re providing a personalized learning experience for every student so they can graduate on time with a plan for their future, whether that’s college, a career, trade certificate or the military,” says Theresa Myers, Greeley-Evans District 6 chief of communications. “We want kids to start thinking about their strengths and abilities by fourth grade.”
Charter school
All three districts also offer free public charter school choices for families who prefer this model. As of the 2023-24 school year, PSD has five charter schools, Greeley-Evans District 6 has six charter schools and TSD has two charter schools. Other area districts have them too; Weld RE-4 School District operates Windsor Charter Academy and the new American Legacy Academy, which is currently in its first school year. Registration for the 2024-25 school year at Weld RE-4 schools opens next month.
Charter schools are within a district but have independent governing bodies. They can offer career pathways similar to public schools or have a specific focus like magnet schools do. Each charter school designates its own policies and timeline for enrollment, and some enter new students into an enrollment lottery (if they aren’t offered a spot for the upcoming school year, their name is placed on a waitlist). Application deadlines vary, with some as early as mid-January.
Mountain Sage Community School, one of PSD’s charter schools in Fort Collins, offers a Waldorf-inspired curriculum for K-8 students. A Waldorf education, founded by Rudolf Steiner in Germany in 1919, provides early literacy foundations via storytelling and play as well as academic teachings through visual and performing arts. The model is usually found in private schools, which are tuition-based and employ a curriculum that draws from various educational philosophies or religious beliefs.
As a public school, Mountain Sage brings an expensive program to a public model, says Hillary Mizia, communications and operations specialist at Mountain Sage.
“We teach math using origami and singing. We’re low-tech—there’s no Smart Boards, just old-fashioned chalkboards where teachers do beautiful chalkboard art,” she says. “It’s a holistic learning experience that promotes learning with human interaction and the Waldorf ‘head, heart, hands’ concept of brain and physical hand connection.”
As a small charter school, Mountain Sage faces budgetary challenges that larger charters and neighborhood schools don’t have, like paying for the facility and not having bus transportation. It also has lower salaries for teachers who, using the Waldorf method, “loop” with (or stay with) their classes from first through fifth grade, allowing them to facilitate students’ growth over a longer period of time.
“Large charters with more students are allocated a higher PPR (per pupil revenue) based on Colorado’s annual count day,” Mizia says. “Our highly talented teachers appreciate the freedom we give them. We’d like to pay them what they’re worth.”
Neither the lack of funding nor the low-tech teaching model equate to low test scores—in fact, it’s quite the opposite. Mountain Sage combines the Waldorf pedagogy with Colorado Academic Standards, including standardized testing. According to Mizia, the school has been at Performance level for at least five years, the highest rating allotted by the Colorado Department of Education (CDE) based on student outcomes in academic achievement, academic growth and postsecondary and workforce readiness.
Early Elementary Chalkboard at MSCS. Art by Ms. Krieves.
Homeschool
Home-based education has become more mainstream over the last couple of decades. Even after the virtual schooling bump caused by the COVID-19 pandemic (with most students returning to in-class education), state records show that more families have chosen to educate their children at home in recent years.
Parents and guardians who homeschool their kids are responsible for their education and must supply books, administer tests and maintain academic records. The homeschooling model is not accredited by the CDE, so there is no public funding and state standardized tests aren’t mandatory. Students can take national standardized achievement tests in grades three, five, seven, nine and 11, or they can have their academic progress evaluated by a qualified person as defined by the CDE.
Families who choose homeschooling or virtual classrooms for their kids can participate in microschools or enhancement programs where small student groups study under adult supervision. Microschools are learning centers (in-person, miniature private schools) or hybrid schools and can involve attending traditional public schools several hours per week. This mix-and-match learning style incorporates socialization and sports opportunities for homeschoolers.
There are lots of other ways for parents to provide enrichment for homeschoolers, like becoming a member of the Northern Colorado Homeschool Association, a nonprofit support group serving families along the Front Range. Inclusive and secular, the organization’s members create fun events such as “Not Back To School” picnics, holiday parties and craft days. The board reserves funds for programs, events and group field trips.
Other homeschool enrichment programs also provide religious teachings. One example is Olive Tree School, a nonprofit created by Fort Collins residents Barbara and Ron Frasco 20 years ago when they were homeschooling their children. The tuition-based enhancement program offers classes grounded in a Biblical worldview, including art, music, science (with labs) and physical education, to supplement at-home learning.
“I observed that my kids were missing out on things I enjoyed in public school,” Ron says. “We found enough Christian homeschool parents to develop the enhancement program, which now extends through 12th grade and has 250 students.”
Whether you’re interested in homeschooling your kids or sending them to a public, charter or private school, the National School Choice Awareness Foundation suggests thinking about what you enjoyed (or didn’t) about your own education. Determining your child’s strengths, weaknesses and learning style can also help you evaluate environments where they’ll thrive.
