DPS Weighs Community Uses For Closed School Buildings

Denver Public Schools is moving forward with plans to repurpose several school buildings closed last year, as district officials weigh proposals and community feedback on how the spaces should be used.

The DPS Board of Education voted unanimously last school year to permanently close seven schools and restructure programs at three others, citing declining enrollment and lower birth rates across Denver. The decision resulted in student and staff reassignments and left five school buildings vacant. Now, the district is working to determine what comes next.

“We are really excited about what we’ve got in store here,” said Andrew Huber, DPS director of enrollment and campus planning. “I think it’s always most important for us to put educational space to work for the purpose it was built for.”

DPS began the process last summer by issuing a request for information to gather ideas for the unused facilities. That has since evolved into formal requests for proposals, or RFPs, for several campuses, including Columbian, Harrington, Palmer, Schmitt and Castro elementary schools.

Alongside the formal process, the district is also seeking community input.

At an April 28 meeting at the International Academy of Denver at Harrington, residents gathered to share ideas for the future of the building. DPS officials indicated a preference for uses that serve the broader community, though they said multiple options remain under consideration.

“Something that came up through this process was a lot of responses that the area could use more community service providers,” Huber said. “That’s the kind of direction we recently put out and we will hold presentations for the community at our meeting.” 

Two organizations presented proposals at the meeting: New Cottage Arts, a nonprofit focused on music and arts education, and the Art Students League of Denver, which offers classes and workshops in visual arts.

“We are excited to share our vision for Harrington,” said Victor Ngo-Smith, founder and executive director of New Cottage Arts. “We previously had a partnership with Harrington before they closed, and we are familiar with the space.”

After the presentations, attention turned to DPS officials, with community members raising questions about other potential uses. Lauren Steidl, a local resident, suggested the building could serve as an early childhood education center, arguing that adding another traditional school could further strain nearby campuses already facing low enrollment.

“All of our schools in this community are struggling budget-wise with fewer enrollments, and this school closed due to low enrollment,” Steidel said. “I think the neighborhood would highly support an ECE center here but I think it’s really hard to see a scenario where a school went in here that would not pull students from close neighborhoods and I think the community would be very unhappy.”

Steidl also noted that only two organizations presented proposals and said she would like to see broader participation in the process. Still, she said the building could accommodate multiple uses.

“I think if this is going to be a community resource hub, you would think there would be a lot more community partners than the two that presented,” Steidel said. “I think the building is plenty big enough for both. I lean towards partners that support traditional underserved communities and there’s plenty of room to have an ECE center and more partners from the community.” 

While plans for Harrington remain under review, DPS has already repurposed two of the closed buildings.

Summit Academy, a district program, relocated into the former Castro Elementary building at 845 S. Lowell Blvd.

“They have been able to expand and run their school for the first time ever,” Huber said, “and it has been really exciting for them.” 

At Palmer Elementary, 995 Grape St., DPS has launched an early childhood education program for three- and four-year-olds, which Huber said is seeing strong demand.

“We are running the Palmer Building as an ECE,” Huber said. “We’re pleased to share that we’ve seen a robust demand.”

Plans for other buildings are still evolving. An initial proposal to convert Columbian Elementary in the Sunnyside neighborhood into an early learning center fell through after multiple providers withdrew. 

“We ran an RFP for Columbian for an Early Childhood Center,” Huber said. “But multiple providers withdrew from the process and so we closed the RFP without awarding it, and we are working on a new plan for the building.”

The Schmitt Elementary building on south Vallejo Street has also not yet been proposed.

“It’s not that we’re not thinking about it—it’s that we want to make sure we get this right,” Huber said. “We want to make sure that we’re doing the right thing for the community.”

DPS officials say they hope to make decisions on several of the vacant buildings by late spring or summer.

“The hope is to award those RFPs in late spring, early summer or over into the summer and fully activate Harrington,” Huber said. “In which this would put us three out of the five buildings to be activated.” 

DPS is expected to hold additional community meetings in the coming months, particularly for buildings like Columbian and Schmitt that remain without finalized plans. For now, the district continues to gather feedback as it works to determine how these former schools can best serve Denver communities moving forward.