Denver Public Schools lays off 38 central office staff, which will save the district $5 million a year ...Middle East

memo Superintendent Alex Marrero distributed Friday.

Slashing those positions, eight of which are vacant, will save the district about $5 million each year starting during the 2025-26 school year. 

“We are facing great uncertainty compounded by significant concerns for our future funding from both the state and national levels,” Marrero wrote in his memo. “This all comes on top of a period of declining birth rates and lower enrollment across our city and the nation. These challenges require us to make difficult decisions to ensure our district’s long-term stability and success.”

The district, the largest in the state with 90,450 students this year, plans to restructure staff in its central office as part of a broader district push to save money, including a hiring freeze for “nonessential” roles in the central office and upcoming school closures.

In November, the Denver school board made a unanimous decision to close seven schools at the end of the school year and scale back the grades they serve at three others.

“This restructuring will provide DPS with the financial flexibility to navigate whatever challenges come our way,” Marrero wrote in the memo. “However, we must also be prepared to make further adjustments should deeper-than-anticipated funding cuts occur at the state or federal level.”

Restructuring will begin in the fall across six administrative departments, according to the memo, but staff changes are effective July 1. However, a copy of a one-page letter obtained by The Colorado Sun obtained that the DPS Office of Talent gave to an employee who was let go stated the person’s job under federal programs “is being reduced” starting April 1. 

“Thank you for your service at DPS and for putting Students First,” the letter, signed by DPS Chief of Staff Edwin Hudson, stated.

DPS officials could not immediately explain why an employee’s end date was earlier than July 1.

The letter given to that employee did not elaborate on why DPS was laying off the staff member but included details on compensation and benefits, with a final paycheck coming April 22 and medical coverage ending April 30. The letter also did not detail any information about severance pay.

The memo from Marrero noted that staff members without a job will get a severance package based on the number of years they have worked for DPS. They can also apply for other vacant positions.

While some of the layoffs impact people who have worked on programs backed by federal funding, the changes were under consideration prior to recent federal funding concerns under the Trump administration.

Some of the restructuring changes will impact teams that handle strategic operations, student discipline and juvenile court liaisons. Additionally, the districdt plans to develop a new team under the Office of Student and Family Empowerment that will be called “Accelerated Trajectory.” That team will focus on students of color, composed of staff who support Native American, Latin and Black students and who work on culture, equity and leadership.

Layoffs in DPS come as other districts across the state worry about their own set of potential layoffs for the 2025-26 school year while lawmakers consider funding cuts to K-12 education to help overcome an estimated $1.2 billion state budget shortfall.

“The people that are going to be hurt most by this are the vulnerable student populations”

Maria Hardman was among those notified Thursday about the end of her employment with the district.

Hardman, who worked for DPS for about a year and a half as a McKinney-Vento specialist, was part of a team of seven responsible for ensuring homeless students could continue attending school. The federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act entitles homeless youths equal access to public education.

Hardman, 33, said she was called into a meeting that lasted less than 10 minutes Thursday as part of a string of back-to-back meetings district leaders held with impacted staff throughout the day.

Hardman said she worries most about how the layoffs will impact DPS’ most vulnerable students, including those without stable housing. Part of her team’s work involved coordinating school transportation for homeless students and identifying the number of homeless youth across the district. By the end of the last school year, Hardman said her caseload stretched to over 600 students struggling with homelessness in northwestern Denver. 

She wonders how a smaller team will be able to handle even larger caseloads.

“It just feels very disappointing,” she said. “I feel badly for myself and my team, but at the end of the day the people that are going to be hurt most by this are the vulnerable student populations, like homeless students and migrant students and foster students and Title I schools. At the end of the day, those are going to be the people most hurt and most affected by this.”

Many of the students Hardman directly supported were gearing up for the transition from high school to their next step, and she educated schools and families on the rights homeless students have to access federal financial aid for college. That included advising unaccompanied homeless youth — students living with someone other than their legal guardian due to domestic or financial circumstances — on how they could apply for federal student aid without their parents. 

“I just worry that there’s going to be more homeless students who are going to fall through the cracks because they think they can’t go to college,” Hardman said.

Her future feels equally unclear, she said, but she remains passionate about working to help position people without housing for a steadier future, even as it challenges professionals like her to find a job “that will keep you from being homeless yourself.” While working for DPS, Hardman has been scraping by on a $52,000 salary while also having to pay nearly $500 per month for health insurance premiums. She has also driven for Uber every day and relied on help from her family so that she could pay her rent and afford food each month. 

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Hardman noted that her meeting with district officials was more “matter of fact” than apologetic, with a quick “good luck and goodbye” sendoff. She isn’t sure she will apply for another job with the district.

“How do I know you’re not going to do something like this again?”

In his memo, Marrero thanked staff being laid off for their “dedicated service” to students and Denver.

“I acknowledge the profound impact this will have on our organization,” he wrote. “Please know that these staffing decisions were not made lightly, and I deeply recognize the personal and professional challenges these changes bring.”

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