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It can be hard to tell the difference between school board candidates in a heavily Democratic city like Denver. The 11 candidates vying for seats this year agree that book bans are bad, all-gender restrooms are good, and schools need more funding.
But there is disagreement among the candidates on whether they think Denver Public Schools is headed in the right direction and whether Superintendent Alex Marrero is doing a good job. And those disagreements often fall along familiar lines, with candidates backed by the teachers union on one side and those backed by organizations tied to charter schools on the other.
Four seats on the seven-member Denver school board are up for grabs on Nov. 4. One is an at-large seat representing the entire city. The other three seats represent specific regions of the city. The election could change the political makeup of the board, which has been controlled for the past six years by members backed by the teachers union.
It’s a key time for the district, which faces declining enrollment, the possibility of more school closures, pressure to raise state test scores, and ultimatums from the Trump administration.
The political lines have blurred over the years and some candidates walk closer to the middle than others. But as much as advocates claim that education reform is dead in Denver and the us-versus-them is over, the hundreds of thousands of dollars being spent by outside groups to support one slate of candidates or the other suggests otherwise.
Spending by teachers unions and pro-charter groups has already topped $1.2 million, according to campaign finance reports, with the pro-charter groups outspending the unions 3 to 1.
How can voters differentiate between the candidates? We combed through interview notes, footage from debates and forums, and the candidates’ answers to Chalkbeat’s questionnaire to summarize where they agree and disagree.
The candidates disagree on Marrero’s performance
Candidates Alex Magaña, Mariana del Hierro, Caron Blanke, Timiya Jackson, and Jeremy Harris gave the lowest marks to Marrero in Chalkbeat’s questionnaire.
Magaña, del Hierro, Blanke, and Jackson have been endorsed by Denver Families Action, a deep-pocketed advocacy group with ties to charter schools.
“In terms of Latinx students’ academic performance and outcomes, I don’t think that the superintendent is doing a good job,” del Hierro said at an October debate co-hosted by Chalkbeat, CBS Colorado, and the advocacy group Educate Denver.
The most recent standardized test scores, from this past spring, show 25% of Latino students in grades three through eight met or exceeded state expectations in literacy, compared to 75% of white students. More than half of DPS students are Latino.
Candidates Scott Esserman, Michelle Quattlebaum, Amy Klein Molk, Xóchitl Gaytán, and Donald “DJ” Torres gave Marrero the highest marks in Chalkbeat’s questionnaire.
“Superintendent Dr. Alex Marrero identifies as an Afro-Latino, bilingual in Spanish,” Gaytán said at the debate. “When he shows up to my district and he’s speaking to the children, he’s speaking to them in Spanish. And the children get really lit up and so excited and so happy.”
Klein Molk, Gaytán, and Torres are endorsed by the Denver Classroom Teachers Association. Gaytán, Esserman, and Quattlebaum are current board members who have supported Marrero and voted to extend his contract. Gaytán also voted to give him a raise.
Candidate Monica Hunter, who was also endorsed by the teachers union, gave the superintendent a middling score in Chalkbeat’s questionnaire. But she was critical of both the current board and the superintendent in the debate co-hosted by Chalkbeat.
“Many candidates will try and gaslight you to make you feel like things are going great,” Hunter said. “We can do better, he can do better, and I will do better.”
The candidates hold different views on charter schools
Marrero was hired in 2021 by a union-backed school board. The union has not been friendly to charter schools, which some see as competing with traditional district-run schools for students and the per-pupil dollars that allow them to hire more staff and offer more programming.
Marrero has not championed charter schools either, recommending that low-performing charters be closed and new ones be blocked from opening as DPS’ enrollment declines.
Of the candidates, Gaytán has been the most critical of charter schools and school choice, which allows students to apply to attend any public school they want. She has called charter schools “privately run schools backed by dark money or profit motives” and has fought to prevent charters from opening in empty district buildings.
Hunter and Klein Molk have said they would prioritize investing in district-run schools.
“If a charter school is not serving all students equitably or is draining resources from neighborhood schools, that’s a problem,” Klein Molk wrote in Chalkbeat’s questionnaire.
Torres said in the questionnaire that the board should take “a firm role” in overseeing charter schools and even consider closing charters that are not serving students equitably.
Incumbents Esserman and Quattlebaum responded to questions about charter schools by criticizing the questions themselves as divisive and unhelpful.
“This question is about adult issues and not kid issues,” Esserman said at the debate co-hosted by Chalkbeat. “Kids don’t care whether they go to a charter, whether they go to an innovation school, or whether they go to a district-run school.”
Magaña, Jackson, and Harris have often struck a middle ground, noting that charter schools are part of the mix in DPS but must be held accountable to serving students well.
Jackson has worked at charter schools and was on the board of Academy 360, a Denver charter that the superintendent recommended closing for low test scores but the school board voted to keep open. Magaña is the executive principal of two Denver innovation schools, which are district-run schools with some charter-like autonomy.
Blanke has been strongest in her support of charter schools. She has repeatedly said that standardized test scores show charter schools do a better job of educating students of color.
According to district data, district-run schools outperformed charter schools overall on state standardized tests this past spring. An independent analysis by the advocacy group Denver Families for Public Schools found that when it comes to traditionally underserved students, charters performed “above or on par with other school types.”
The candidates would approach school closures differently
School closures are another controversial issue where some candidates disagree. Most of the candidates have said they oppose closing schools due to low test scores or low enrollment. That includes the three incumbents — Gaytán, Esserman, and Quattlebaum — who voted to close schools for low enrollment last year. All three said such closures should be a “last resort.”
But Blanke and del Hierro said in Chalkbeat’s questionnaire that they would close schools for those reasons. “The reality is that we are facing declining enrollment in the district and there are schools that are not educating students at the proficiency levels they should,” Blanke wrote.
At a forum hosted by the Denver Democrats, del Hierro held up a printout of the state ratings for the schools in southwest Denver, the region she is vying to represent. Most schools were rated red, which is the lowest on the state’s color-coded scale.
“I think our southwest Denver kids deserve better,” she said at the forum.
The candidates vary on school police and cell phone bans
Most candidates have said they support police officers in schools. Two of the incumbents, Esserman and Quattlebaum, do not. Both voted against bringing back school resource officers after a spate of shootings in and around Denver’s East High School in 2023.
The candidates are also split on whether cell phones should be banned in schools. A new state law requires all Colorado school districts to enact policies regarding cell phone and smartwatch use by July 2026. DPS doesn’t currently have a districtwide policy.
Klein Molk, Blanke, Jackson, and Torres said in Chalkbeat’s questionnaire that cell phones should be banned in schools. The rest of the candidates are opposed to a ban. A recent study of a large urban school district in Florida found modest improvements in test scores in the second year of the district’s cell phone ban, after an increase in suspensions in the first year.
Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.
