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In Colorado, all children between the ages of six and twenty-one years old have the right to a free education through public schools. State law also permits non-public education, such as private or homeschooling. This issue brief provides information on the laws that govern public and non-public education.  

When Colorado became a state, the federal government granted the state lands to be held in an intergenerational public trust to support public education. This trust is made up of about 2.8 million acres of surface land and 4.0 million subsurface acres, and is managed by the State Land Board (SLB) in the Deparment of Natural Resources. This issue brief discusses how revenue earned on those lands is used, invested, and spent for public education.

This issue brief provides an overview of the state governance structure for public K-12 schools and discusses the main provisions of the school accountability system in Colorado.

The quality of child care is a key concern for parents and policymakers.  Child care allows parents to remain in the workforce and contributes to a child’s development.  This issue brief provides an overview of the financial assistance available to families needing child care, briefly describes the licensing of child care centers, and explains where to find child care quality ratings.  

The Colorado Department of Early Childhood (CDEC), Colorado’s newest state department, began operations in July 2022 to provide a range of programs and services that support young children, families, and the professionals that serve them.  This issue brief provides an overview of the CDEC, including its creation, programs and services offered through the department, and budget for FY 2022-23.

Vaccinations offer protection from common infectious diseases.  The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends specific vaccines for all infants, children, and adults during their lifetime to provide immunity from preventable illness.  A recent analysis estimated that for children born in a single year in the United States, vaccination prevented nearly 20 million cases of disease and over 40,000 deaths.

Reading competency is pivotal to the academic development of Colorado’s students.  State law targets the early elementary grades as the essential time and location for developing the reading skills necessary for successful academic achievement in later grades.  This issue brief provides an overview of the Colorado Reading to Ensure Academic Development (READ) Act, and discusses recent changes to state funding for READ Act implementation.

During the 2008 session, the General Assembly enacted House Bill 08-1335, the Building Excellent Schools Today (BEST) act. The act replaced existing law concerning state financial assistance for public school capital construction and established a grant program in order to accelerate funding for K-12 capital construction. This issue brief discusses the origins and administration of the BEST program and funding for BEST projects.

Personally identifiable information (PII) is information that can be used to trace or identify an individual. In Colorado K-12 education, the term refers to student data collected and retained by public schools and school districts, and maintained by the Colorado Department of Education (CDE). This Issue Brief provides an overview of

Colorado law provides distinct roles for the Colorado Department of Education (CDE) and the State Board of Education (state board) in overseeing charter schools. Colorado's charter schools are authorized through a local school district or the state Charter School Institute (CSI). The CSI was created in 2004 as an independent agency within CDE. It currently authorizes 35 charter schools, and is the only statewide, non-district authorizer.

The “negative factor” is a provision in state law that reduces the amount of total program funding and state aid provided to K-12 school districts.  This issue  brief  discusses how the negative factor is applied in the School Finance Act (SFA), gives a short history of school finance leading to the creation of the  negative factor, and provides a summary of the recent legal challenge to the negative factor.

State law defines "achievement gap" as the difference in academic achievement attained by student groups on the statewide assessments and "growth gap" as the differences among student groups in the rates of academic growth.1 Achievement gaps are observable between racial or ethnic groups of students in Colorado, as well as between socioeconomic groups and genders. This issue brief provides a statistical overview of the achievement gap in Colorado.

Remedial education refers to academic courses in higher education intended to improve the basic skills of new or returning college students, so that they are adequately prepared for college-level work. These basic skills courses are typically non-credit courses. This issue brief discusses how students are identified for remediation, the number involved, the cost, and recent innovations intended to reduce the incidence of remediation at higher education institutions in Colorado.

Assessments provide teachers, parents, students, policymakers, and other stakeholders in Colorado's education system with a way of measuring student performance against state standards. First administered on a statewide basis in 1997 under the name Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP), statewide assessments are designed to provide measurements of students' academic progress and are used to evaluate the effectiveness of teachers, administrators, schools, and districts.

Academic standards provide a broad outline for what students are expected to know and be able to do at the end of each grade level, and for what students should know in order to be prepared to enter college or the workforce by the time they graduate from high school. In Colorado, academic standards are also the basis of the annual statewide assessment.

Academic standards provide a broad outline for what students are expected to know and be able to do at the end of each grade level, and for what students should know in order to be prepared to enter college or the workforce by the time they graduate from high school. In Colorado, academic standards are also the basis of the annual statewide assessment.