Boulder Prep Summative Report Charter Renewal Application 2026.pdf (369 KB)

Summative Report Authorizer Staff Recommendations and Areas of Concern Boulder Prep Charter Renewal Application Site Visit Executive Summary

CHARTER RENEWAL SUMMATIVE REPORT for Boulder Prep School School Name:

Boulder Prep School

Executive Directors and Principals:

Lili Adeli, Headmaster Dominick Walls, Program Director

Chair, Board of Directors:

Governing Board: Lili Adeli, M.B.A., M.Ed - Headmaster, LiliAdeli@BoulderPrep.org, Term: Indefinite Daniel Moore, Ph.D. - Chair, dmoore72@msudenver.edu, Term: 1/24-1/27 Lauren Burdekin - Treasurer, laurenburdekin@gmail.com, Term: 10/24-10/27 Stephani Williams, M.B.A. - Secretary, stephani89@live.com, Term: 1/25-1/28 Rolly Schendel, Ph.D. - Member, rschende@msudenver.edu, Term: 12/25-12/28 Manijeh Taherynia, MA, CPA - Member, manijeht2012@gmail.com, Term: 6/23-6/26 Derek Sweeney - Member, derek.Sweeney@colorado.edu, 720-979-4693, Term: 6/25-6/28

Review Committee:

Dr. Bianca Gallegos, Charter Authorizer & Executive Director of Strategic Partnerships Dr. James Hill, Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Dr. Emma Herzog, Executive Director of Academics Kristin Nelson-Steinhoff, Director of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Education Michelle Brenner, Executive Director of Special Education Katie Mills, Director of Professional Learning 1

Tamara Acevedo, Executive Director of Northwest Network Dr. Jessica Alzen, Executive Director of Accountability & Evaluation Dr. Elizabeth Lundell, Equity Counsel / Title IX Coordinator Sennen Knauer, Director of Student Support Services Mike Wilcox, Director of Student Enrollment Bill Sutter, Chief Financial Officer Recommendation from Charter Authorizer:

The Boulder Prep Charter Contract is recommended for renewal.

Charter Renewal Application Section / Body of Evidence

Strengths

Questions or Concerns

Annual Accountability Report shows historical data on student achievement, growth, graduation, attendance, dropout, and credit completion.

●​ Appreciate the myriad ways accountability data is tracked and considered

●​ Curious about the Boulder Prep team’s analysis on why the ACT growth is what it is and what possible next steps exist ●​ Curious about the team’s planned next steps for increasing student pass rates

School Performance Framework

●​ SPF is at Performance

●​ Similar to previous - curious about team’s analysis on ACT growth and planned next steps ●​ Curious about analysis of current truancy rates and planned next steps to improve

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Part 1, Section 1 of Charter Renewal Application

Solid, comprehensive application that is thorough and demonstrates overall values, vision and future of the school.

School Calendar

Year-round learning has demonstrated None to work well for students and staff.

Master Staff Schedule

Varied opportunities done creatively despite having a smaller staff.

Staff Roster

The staff is experienced, prepared None and provided an abundance of various opportunities for students.

Curriculum Overview

●​ Courses clearly listed ●​ A variety of offerings for students across content areas

●​ Would be curious to know more about what standards are covered in which courses, particularly core content areas, and how content is differentiated for student need

English Learner Self-Reflection Over the past several years, students identified as English Language Learners (ELLs) have made up fewer than 2% of our school population; however, this number has been gradually increasing. In response, all teachers have been trained and continue to receive ongoing professional development focused on best instructional practices to support diverse learners.

●​ Whole staff approach ●​ Aware of their increase in numbers ●​ Language learning includes culturally responsive teaching as well.

●​ I’d love specificity around the PD and the accountability measure to ensure that teachers are applying the scaffolds and differentiated instruction outlines ●​ Are there CLDE endorsed teachers on staff and how do they capitalize on their knowledge? ●​ What is the plan to address the unique, specific needs of MLLs? ●​ How will language development progress be monitored and how will we ensure that students participate in the annual ACCESS

Much of this training emphasizes strategies such as scaffolding and differentiation to ensure that instruction meets the needs of all students, including those with significant skill gaps. Additionally, our classes commonly provide universal accommodations. This means that many supports are available to all students, regardless of whether they have a formal IEP or 504 plan. These structures help

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assessment as a summative indicator of their language development

ensure that students who are learning English as an additional language have equitable access to their education. Our professional development programming also includes dedicated segments on multicultural education. Over the past few years, this has been a major area of emphasis, with a focus on equipping teachers to meet students from diverse cultural backgrounds where they are. As our school’s demographics continue to evolve and become more diverse, we remain committed to fostering inclusive, culturally responsive teaching practices. SPED Self-Reflection Our school has one full-time Special Education (SPED) Case Manager who oversees the management, implementation, and compliance of all Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) and 504 Plans. The district assigns a school psychologist who works with our SPED Manager approximately two days per week to support with annual reviews, re-evaluations, new evaluations, and some direct services. Our special education process is highly collaborative. During weekly staff meetings, the SPED Case Manager provides updates on upcoming IEP and 504 meetings. Teachers are asked to contribute observations about how accommodations are being implemented in the classroom, as well as information about each student’s strengths, progress toward goals, and areas where goals may still be in progress. This information is reviewed by the SPED Case Manager and used to complete reviews and re-evaluations. Staff members receive regular training on accommodations and best practices for supporting students with diverse learning needs. These trainings occur during weekly staff meetings as well as during annual professional development sessions. Sometimes these trainings are led by our SPED Case Manager, and other times they are facilitated by district personnel or other experts in the field.

Boulder Prep has a wonderful small school model that is unique and attracts students to BVSD who are neurodivergent. Large environments are challenging for some students and Boulder Prep provides a lot through their general education environment in terms of flexibility, relationships, affective and organizational support and generally strength based learning. Students have natural breaks, they are encouraged to cook or do music or just be who they are. And this is all before we layer on the support of special education.

The staff at Prep just continues to need to work through the required processes for transferring in students with complex IEPs. They have the concepts down and the collaboration, but we need to get better on the clarity of the paperwork and the data when things get more complex. With close collaboration with District Sped Admin things tend to work well. As they onboard a new special education teacher this year, close collaboration will continue to be needed.

Special education has been very integrated and collaborative at Prep, meaning that students don’t always need as much when they get to this school due to the amount they get support from the total environment. Their 1 teacher model works. Their 4

The number of students receiving special education services fluctuates each year, but typically around 30–40% of our students have either a 504 Plan or an IEP. At the start of each term, teachers review the accommodations listed for students on their rosters to ensure they understand how to support them effectively. If teachers need assistance implementing accommodations, they can consult directly with the SPED Case Manager for guidance and support.

collaborative approach works. They are willing to consult and try working with some unique kids and many times those kids thrive at Prep.

Our school operates at a resource service level, which allows us to serve a wide range of students whose IEPs are written at the resource level. Oftentimes, we are asked to take students with higher needs because the students continue to struggle in other settings. In these cases, we consult with the student, family, sending school and the district SPED team to determine whether Boulder Prep is an appropriate placement. This has resulted in many ICAN students transferring to Boulder Prep. Staff PD Plan In general, staff meet weekly for 2.5-3 hours every Tuesday after school. These meetings focus on current school topics, new students, ongoing student needs, upcoming events, and collaborative lesson planning for Life Skills programming and future courses. Weekly meetings also include embedded professional development, with staff members occasionally leading short 30-40 minute micro–PD sessions ranging from differentiated learning, incorporating movement, or emerging AI applications. At times, representatives from BVSD or outside partners are invited to present on relevant topics.

Full day PD and weekly PD times are allocated. Collaboration with Peak to Peak around instructional practices

Is there a conversation between administrator and teacher regarding focus areas for independent PL? If an educator is struggling in a certain area are they directed to that focus area?

More formal professional development occurs during extended sessions: three full days in the summer and three full days in the winter. These sessions typically feature guest speakers addressing key areas such as trauma-informed practices, supporting neurodivergent students, classroom management, burnout prevention, and staff wellness. Staff also lead micro–PD sessions during these days to share any passions or areas of expertise with the staff. 5

Each year, we try to have a theme for our professional development. Last year, the school invested a majority of its professional development funds in a partnership with Peak to Peak High School. Their team provided focused training on instructional best practices, including pedagogy, classroom management, lesson design, assessment strategies, and student engagement. This partnership was highly successful and responded directly to staff interest in strengthening instructional practice. This year, the school implemented a more personalized and innovative professional development model. Staff participated in a “choose-your-own-adventure” PD structure, identifying one classroom-based goal and one community-based goal. Each staff member completed at least 10 hours of learning or research for each goal. Staff then shared their learning through short presentations during winter and summer professional development sessions. This model allows educators to pursue areas of personal interest while contributing their learning back to the team. Funding is made available to staff for conferences or trainings that align with the overall mission of Boulder Prep. This is a teacher self reflection template. Is there an evaluation template that is completed by the evaluator? If not, where is the evaluation feedback documented? How is data used to guide the evaluation progress/growth of the educator towards student emotional and academic growth?

Teacher/Leader Evaluation Template

Staff Handbook

Strong mission and alignment. Clear sense of culture and expectations, strong emphasis on safety and risk awareness

Is policy aligned with employment law. Some of the language is too informal or objective. A lot of operational procedures are in one document. 6

Maybe some of can live in an employee handbook. Classroom Observation Protocol

Observation look fors identified - are these discussed with teachers ahead of time and in alignment with your professional learning areas of focus?

Questions on the observation document are not aligned with the look fors on the second page. Perhaps consider changing questions to be more closely tied to those look fors. Are there reflective questions teachers are asked in debrief? If not, recommendation to build those into the process. Some questions may result in a subjective response based on the evaluator. For example “What did the

teacher do well during this lesson?” consider asking questions that more closely align to research based best practices. For example, change the question above to, “Teacher used the following strategies to create an environment where students were able to meet or exceed the standard being addressed” Assessment Plan (including Interim Assessments) Boulder Prep uses the Pre-ACT and ACT to measure student achievement and growth. Testing for seniors is done in October in preparation for submitting college applications. Our April round of testing is focused on 9th, 10th, and 11th graders, but 12th graders can test again if they want to improve their scores.

Plan and timing for the Pre-ACT and ACT provides a clear vertical scale through students’ high school careers.

I wonder about any consistent interim assessments that allow for school-wide progress monitoring at the course level.

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Outside of this standardized testing plan, teachers include formative and summative assessments in their classes. Graduation Requirements

●​ Graduation requirements are clearly laid out

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UIP Plan

●​ Clarity on purpose of school and how different approach to supporting students ●​ Clarity on UIP goals & rationale

●​ Wondering about course syllabus details and instructional content as potential lever to increase student engagement

Board Meeting Schedule

The board meetings are publicly posted, with limited terms and direct contact information readily available for all board members.

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Board Roster

The board is composed of a representative group of stakeholders that help ensure the effective running of the board.

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Strategic Plan Boulder Prep Strategic Vision 2026 – 2031: 1.​ Staff Satisfaction & Staff Development: The board recognizes it is crucial to resist stagnation amongst teaching and administrative staff and promote self-efficacy, innovation, collaboration and development for highly effective teaching. It is our vision to inspire the staff to identify high-impact professional learning opportunities that continue to develop their skillset. Further, the board will continue to develop specific policies and effective incentives that support staff professional learning. The board recognizes that promoting staff work-life-balance is also important to their effectiveness as practitioners.

The strategic plan is clear and focuses on staff development, financial sustainability, governance and partnerships. The plan highlights the board’s awareness of workforce needs. In addition the plan emphasises staff wellness and retention.

Key areas for improvement for the strategic plan include measurable student outcomes and timelines connected to intended outcomes.

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As a board, we will continue to develop opportunities and funding for meaningful staff member wellness. 2.​ Program Financial Development: While Boulder prep has historically been fiscally healthy, the funding landscape is changing. The Boulder Prep Board is committed to continuing a multi-strand funding strategy that weaves together grants, 501c3 advancement, and state funding in ways that make staff compensation more competitive, school operations sustainable, and the 5-year fiscal outlook healthy. Strong financials are also important to increase competitiveness of staff compensation to continue recruiting and retaining effective teachers. 3.​ Review and ensure responsible governance: The Board will work with school leadership to clarify staff roles and workload to ensure effective school operations. The BP board will develop a clear and effective Headmaster evaluation process and support the current headmaster in evaluating staffing needs and roles. The Boulder Prep Board will review current policies to ensure they are meeting the operational and governance needs of the school. Further, they will revise and develop policies as necessary to ensure effective operations and governance. 4.​ Partnerships and Community Collaboration: We will continue building partnerships that support and enhance the Boulder Prep mission to provide unique learning and experiential opportunities for the students. Board Handbook (including Bylaws and Conflict of Interest Policy)

The handbook and bylaws are comprehensive and cover many essential aspects of governance for a charter school.

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Completed Board Self-Evaluation

Standard, well rounded template. Reflection demonstrates strengths and key next steps for growth. Board members show strong alignment with Boulder Prep's mission of individualized, relationship-centered education, with decisions consistently evaluated through a mission-aligned lens and a commitment to student well-being and postsecondary readiness.

The board acknowledges gaps in Head of School evaluation processes, community partnership development, and board member professional development and has outlined concrete action steps for each, including adoption of League of Charter Schools training modules and a goal to establish three new community partnerships by 2026–27.

Organizational Chart

Standard

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Complaint/Grievance Policy

Acknowledges that complaints can be made in a variety of ways and identifies how and to whom those complaints can be submitted

Policy is not compliant with requirements in SB 296 which govern incidents of student experienced discrimination/harassment.

Title IX Plan/Policy

Follows BVSD’s legally compliant Title IX policy

School should ensure they are reporting to the BVSD Title IX Coordinator any incidents of misconduct that fall under the definition of Sexual Harassment so the Title IX process can be appropriately followed.

Student Discipline Policy

The commitment to a restorative approach is consistent and strong as well as their visible and clear four agreements. Supporting students to get to a point that they can take accountability for harm caused and to ensure that such incidents are used for learning to the greatest extent

What is the staff’s individual level of training in restorative justice practices? How could the discipline guidance flowcharts be revised to follow similar patterns and design, for example common language (flowchart vs. checklist), using the same font on

Student conduct is based on the following four agreements: 1.​ Respect everyone’s educational opportunity 2.​ Respect the entire building 3.​ Respect each others belongings 4.​ Respect everyone’s right to make amends

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Any conduct or behavior that does not follow these agreements is addressed on an individual basis by the administration and in consultation with faculty and any other appropriate parties and/or agencies. Student discipline will also be addressed on an individual basis. Any necessary disciplinary action is taken in accordance with the student’s individual rights and in consideration of student’s academic best interest and the community’s best interest. Boulder Prep primarily uses restorative practices to address discipline issues. The following are some of the protocols/practices used: 1.​ Marijuana Offense Flowchart 2.​ Alcohol Restorative Checklist 3.​ Derogatory Language 1st Offense Packet 4.​ Bullying Restorative Packet and Mediation 5.​ Vaping Restorative Packet

Student discipline data by subgroup for previous four years The following table shows behavior incidents based on subgroup for the last four years. 22/23 23/24 24/25 25/26 White 12 10 10 14 Asian 0 0 1 1 Black 0 0 1 0

possible is a cornerstone of the school’s culture.

documents, housing the documents in a common place. How are students taught the behavioral expectations? Suggestion to include more clear behavioral expectations in the Parent/Student Handbook that include more than cell phones and vaping. What is the school’s ODR process (office discipline referral)? What support does the school need to better utilize the BVSD discipline guidance docs to ensure accurate discipline documentation in IC? How does their individualized approach to discipline incidents get checked for bias? How does the school support students with the written learning activities when they cause harm if they need a differentiated approach? How many RJ Conferences does the school facilitate each year and do they track those numbers and recurrences afterward? How does the school determine what discipline incidents get put into IC? To what does the school attribute their racially disproportionate discipline?

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Hispanic/Latino

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Solid simple enrollment.

Parent/Student Handbooks (including Student Admissions, Lottery, Waiting List, Recruitment, and Enrollment Policies; lottery and enrollment forms) Enrollment Policy

They appear to conform to federal steps for enrolling students on an IEP.

As they have not needed a lottery in 5 years it isn’t crucial, but it may be worthwhile to see how they would accomplish that, actually. When we completed this year’s Instructional Days and Hours collection Boulder Prep was short of their mandatory 1080 hours in a year. They came in at: 955.1 hours. The school needs to address this, as they acknowledge the statutory requirement in their charter. I don’t see what their contractual caps on enrollment are. They use a # served, not a number enrolled which makes me wonder if they use a different metric to meet contract.

Student Enrollment by Subgroups (last 4 years)

# Served IEP/504 BIPOC LGBTQ Low Income High Risk

22/23 139 47% 48% 15% 23% 92%

23/24 138 44% 45% 18% 20% 92%

24/25 135 37% 46% 22% 34% 92%

25/26 122 25% 50% 27% 30% 90%

Re-enrollment Rates (last 4 years) Percent of Eligible Students who continued @ Boulder Prep the Following Year 21/22 22/23 23/24 24/25 75% 76% 75% 80%

The percentages will then vary from the Special Programs Report each year that are based on enrollments at the time of October Count. Comparing roll-up and designated returning 12th grade students over time, these figures look accurate.

Hidden in here is a concept of graduation/retention. Not sure if that is important for negotiations, but it made me wonder how their grad/drop rates were doing.

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Student Enrollment Projections We anticipate keeping a steady enrollment of 100 students +/10 students.

I thought that charter schools had enrollment caps. What are the maximum students allowed by contract? If they don’t need a school only lottery they are probably under that total. For Count for the past three years we see: 2023-114, 2024-115, 2025-92

Waivers

Will be addressed during negotiations

Requests for Contract Modifications** Boulder Prep serves a unique role within the BVSD community. We take on some of the most difficult cases and often see amazing transformations in students who would have likely ended up dropping out. These cases take a great deal of work from our team who provides individualized support academically, socially, and emotionally.

Will be addressed during negotiations

A huge part of our success with disengaged kids is having low student to staff ratios and specialized staff members to do intensive case management. Our staffing numbers right now are not enough as everyone is managing one crisis after another on top of widening skills gaps. Academic Intervention classes need 1 teacher for a maximum of five students. We appreciate BVSD’s commitment and efforts to achieve equity. It’s clear that Boulder Prep students are coming with greater need, so the funding should be equitable to meet those needs. Knowing that more than 90% of Boulder Prep students are identified as high-risk, we are humbly requesting equitable funding to help our students achieve in the same way as their Boulder Valley counterparts. Our mill share has been cut by 5% on top of rising costs making it harder to sustain our staffing ratio and diverse programming. Any of the following options would make a tremendous difference in our ability to meet the kids where they are at and achieve respective growth. 13

Funding/Support Options 1.​ 100% Mill Share as an Alternative Education Campus to support equity. 2.​ $1000 per student equity payment- would be used to sustain low student to staff ratios and offset the rising costs for insurance and central services fees including SPED and IT. 3.​ 1.0 FTE for a PARA - would focus on supporting students with ASD/ADD/ADHD/Executive Functioning needs 4.​ 1.0 FTE for a School Security/Campus Monitor - would help monitor for issues and regulate behavior throughout the day to take that load off of teachers who are trying to focus on learning. 5.​ 1.0 FTE for an Academic Interventionist - would focus on intensive math and language arts remediation for students performing below grade level proficiency. Grant funding for this ended in FY23. Financial Policies and Procedures ●​ Internal Controls & Spending Policy ●​ Boulder Prep Investment Policy

●​ Implied following BVSD policies although thresholds do not align. ●​ The investment policy is for the external 501(c)(3). BVSD funds are maintained under the district’s investment policy.

Annual Independent Audit

Located on the school financial transparency website. No issues noted by external auditors.

Audit’s Management Letter

No issues noted by external auditors.

●​ The board chair should review/approve the headmaster’s purchases. The current structure allows for a subordinate to approve a supervisor’s purchases, creating a risk of implied coercion. ●​ The organization may want to adopt a more prudent standard of government funds investing where protection of principal, liquidity and yield are the criteria for investing, to minimize risk.

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Unaudited Financial Statements

Located on the school financial transparency website and appear to be up to date.

An individual brokerage account with E-Trade is a high risk endeavor.

Long-term budget

Reasonable assumptions made on long term student enrollment.

The budget is very high level with not much detail. The budget is anticipating spending $700K in fund balance over 5 years which does not have any explanation as to why. Using the office of state auditors A-1 calculations it would indicate that fiscal health rate indicators would be identified as deficit ratio and not meeting benchmarks. Detailed analysis can be found here.

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