The Adams 14 school district announced the resignation of its board president Tuesday afternoon.
Ramona Lewis, who was elected in November 2019 and was to serve until 2023, resigned suddenly. Her resignation was effective immediately.
Reached by phone, Lewis said she stepped down for personal reasons but would not specify what they were.
“It was just a decision I needed to make,” Lewis said. But she added that she is committed to continuing to support the district’s work.
The district’s announcement stated that the board and Adams 14 Superintendent Karla Loria “regretfully accepted the resignation.”
By state law, the board must declare a vacancy and start taking applications from those interested in finishing Lewis’s term.
The Adams 14 school board, like the district, is familiar with turnover. The last board member to resign was Regina Hurtado in 2021, when she moved out of the district.
Before that, the board had a vacancy in 2020, when a board member’s term expired and no one ran to replace her. In 2019, a board member resigned in the middle of an investigation into an incident in which he had improperly accompanied his wife to a substitute teaching assignment in the district. In 2018, the then-board president resigned, just before the State Board issued its first order asking the district to hire an outside manager.
The district is now at another turning point after the state ordered it to reorganize amid continued academic struggles.
The state has not yet initiated that process, and a district lawsuit seeking to stop that order is pending.
Adams 14 board member Maria Zubia said Tuesday she was sad to see Lewis step down but was not concerned about the board or district being able to continue moving forward.
“I wouldn’t have been able to take this work on without Ramona Lewis and Renee Lovato,” Zubia said, speaking of two board members. “It was because of them that I decided to do this. I could see a vision. I thought we could really do more together. I’m grateful I got to serve with her.”
Reflecting on her time on the board, Lewis said hiring Loria as superintendent is the thing she is most proud of.
“We had a board for the first time where we were all on the same page, focused on our children.”
Yesenia Robles is a reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado covering K-12 school districts and multilingual education. Contact Yesenia at yrobles@chalkbeat.org.
