HOME SCHOOLING IN DENVER
Home schooling offers parents another
option for educating their children. Parents
who home school their children must follow
the same general educational requirements
mandated for public or private academic
programs in Colorado. Parents are required
to provide instruction for a minimum of four
hours per day, 172 days a year.
Parents of home-schooled students are
also encouraged to allow their children to
participate in the extracurricular activities
offered by public schools. See the Home
Schooling listings for more information
and resources.
COLORADO K- 12 STANDARDS
AND TESTING
The Colorado Department of Education has
implemented rigorous standards and
developed tools to help identify and close
achievement gaps.
The department’s SchoolView portal
( www.schoolview.org) is a good resource
for parents, policymakers, and the general
public, giving them visibility into how well
school districts and individual schools are
meeting statewide academic standards.
Colorado requires annual student testing to
determine whether students are meeting
established knowledge levels expected for
their grade level. The Colorado Student
Assessment Program (CSAP) administers this
statewide testing to make sure students are
meeting grade-level standards in
mathematics, science, reading, and writing.
The program provides a series of snapshots
of student achievement in reading, writing,
math and science as the students move
through the third through the 10th grades.
The Colorado Department of Education
(CDE) reports CSAP results for the state and
for each local school district, and schools
must meet minimum CSAP standards to
maintain accreditation. Refer to the
SchoolView Portal or to the CDE Web site
at www.cde.state.co.us for more
information on testing. See the Public
Schools for a listing of Denver area public
school districts.
COLLEGE PLACEMENT TESTS –
AND GREAT RESULTS
Other testing includes such standard
college entrance exams as the American
College Test (ACT) and the Scholastic
Aptitude Test (SAT) – and Colorado students
excel in both areas. The ACT is the primary
college entrance exam in Colorado and is
required for all 11th grade students.
In 2013, Colorado students’ average ACT
score was 20. 4 (the national average
was 20. 9). It’s important to note that part
of the disparity is related to Colorado’s
universal testing requirement. Colorado is
one of just three states that require all
students to take the ACT – not just those
who are college-bound.
In 2013, nearly 7,500 Colorado high
school students took the SAT and received
an average composite score of 1721. The
highest possible SAT score is 2400, and
the nationwide average was 1498 in
2013. Students in Colorado consistently
rank in the top 25 percent in the nation for
the highest ACT and SAT scores per 1,000
high school graduates.
A LONG HISTORY OF HIGHER
EDUCATION
Higher education has quite a long history in
Denver, and the city is home to some of the
oldest universities in the western United
States. For example, the University of
Denver, established in 1864, is the oldest
independent university in the Rocky
Mountain region. Other universities
established in the 19th century include:
Colorado State University (1870);
Colorado School of Mines (1874);
University of Colorado at Boulder (1876);
and Regis University (1877).
Today, there are approximately 153, 100
students enrolled in four-year educational
programs throughout the region, and
Denver is home to 12 four-year public and
private colleges and universities. The area’s
five community colleges have more than 20
campuses, and there are more than 300
vocational and technical schools in the
region, providing a large network of
workforce training and educational services
to meet the training and employment needs
of both students and area businesses.
A number of smaller colleges and
technical and vocational schools with
specialized programs also offer a variety
of educational opportunities. For
example, the Auraria Higher Education
Center, adjacent to downtown Denver,
has the largest concentration of students
in metro Denver. The University of
Colorado Denver, Metropolitan State
College, and the Community College of
Denver share the 127-acre campus and
serve more than 58,000 students.
Colorado’s universities are also prominent
members of the academic research
community. The University of Colorado at
Boulder received a record $351.9 million
in sponsored research awards in fiscal year
2013; the University of Colorado Denver
received $19.1 million in fiscal year 2013
awards; the University of Colorado
Anschutz Medical Campus received
$395.2 million; the University of Colorado
at Colorado Springs was awarded $7.8
million, and The Colorado School of Mines
received a $10 million research grant
award from the Alpha Foundation for the
Improvement of Mine Safety and Health.
See the Higher Education listings for more
information and resources.
SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE!
Whatever your educational goal or
preference, choices for everyone in the
family abound with Denver’s comprehensive
offering of great public schools, quality
private schools, alternative educational
opportunities with homeschooling and
charter schools, and a huge selection of
higher education, technical and vocational
options. Welcome to Denver!
