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BROMWELL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL (214)
2500 East
Fourth Avenue,
80206-4214
(Columbine Street at East Fourth Avenue)

Telephone:
(303) 388-5969
Fax: (720) 424-9355
E-mail: Bromwell@dpsk12.org

Mr. Jonathan Wolfer, Principal

Bromwell: The Overwhelming Choice

There are some days when secretaries Judy Baumgartner and Cheryl Nolen -- given a choice -- might limit other people's choices to 83 out of 84: any Denver public elementary school except theirs.

With the end of busing in 1996, the freedom of parents to enroll their kids in any school with space available became a fact of life in the Denver Public School District. Many people think it's one of DPS' best features.

Those people have never worked at Bromwell Elementary School.

"It took me two days to get rid of my migraine," Baumgartner says a few days after the end of the first round of school choice, a month that seemed like a year. From mid-January to mid-February, Baumgartner processed 120 choice applications from Bromwell student wannabes. And it's far from over.

In the world of DPS planning, Bromwell is known as a "get-to" school. Every year, parents clamor for one of its coveted kindergarten openings, making it the district's most sought-after elementary school.

But popularity comes at a price, and Principal Frank Bingham and secretaries Nolen and Baumgartner end up paying. They hand out the reality checks.

At least half of the current crop of Bromwell hopefuls are going to be disappointed, and the principal and his staff believe in making that clear up-front.

In the DPS enrollment kingdom, neighborhood kids rule; they're guaranteed a seat. Then come the siblings of current choice students, who get first dibs on up to half the available choice slots.

After those children have been accommodated, Bingham says he has two to eight places left in next fall's kindergarten classes. Painful news for 66 anxious parents.

"It can be difficult to tell them at first how small their chances are," Bingham says. "Then after somebody doesn't get in, it can be tough to have to tell them 'Sorry.' "

The difficulty of getting into Bromwell is even more stunning in light of the fact that the school has more choice students than any other elementary in the district -- a whopping 55 percent of its total enrollment.

That's because the ritzy townhomes that surround the school in the heart of Cherry Creek North house few families with school-age kids. Without choice students, Bromwell wouldn't serve enough children to justify its existence, especially since it occupies a block of real estate worth millions. A school with a lesser reputation might not have survived.

Just over half of Bromwell's 320 students are there because their parents want them to be, not because they live in the neighborhood. Most of them, such as fourth-grader Natalie, came in as kindergartners and stayed; once accepted as choice students, the spot is theirs to keep throughout their grade school career.

Natalie started kindergarten the first year school choice was available, a time when it might have been easier to get in, says her mother, Stephanie.

"I've heard it's gotten insane," she says. "It wasn't that hard when we got Natalie in."

Even though the family lives in Park Hill and considers Park Hill Elementary a good choice, they've kept Natalie at Bromwell because her experience there has been wonderful. Now the question is, what to do about Natalie's little brother, who starts kindergarten in the fall?

Park Hill would be closer, but having both kids in the same school next year would be convenient. Plus Natalie already car pools to Bromwell with several other families from their neighborhood.

"We're going round and round," Stephanie says. "We did fill out a choice application at Bromwell. I had a conversation with the principal and asked him what the likelihood is Natalie's brother will get in."

It's a conversation Bingham has a lot, but in this case, he had some encouraging words. The chances are actually good; the fact that his sister already attends Bromwell gives him priority.

Without that edge, why do parents even bother?

Bingham sums it up in two words: test scores.

Last year, 96 percent of Bromwell's third-graders scored proficient or better on the Colorado Student Assessment Program, making it No. 2 in the district. High test scores equal high demand, says DPS planning czar Dave Lowry. Schools at the top of the CSAP heap always attract the most choice applications.

But Bingham tries to make sure parents understand that a place at Bromwell doesn't guarantee success for their child.

"I'm usually pretty quick to explain that there are a lot of things that contribute to high test scores," he says. "I tell them that we do feel we have a good program here, and I'm very confident that we have high quality teachers, but that's not all that goes into test scores."

That caveat apparently hasn't dampened demand. Every day, parents still drop by to submit choice forms -- even though at this late date, their 5-year-olds are unlikely to get into Bromwell next fall.

After years of experience, Baumgartner and Nolen know what to say to parents, how to keep things friendly without giving anyone false hope. Their approach works. Mostly.

"A few bend us out of shape," Nolen says. She's thinking about a mother who didn't seem to grasp why Bromwell won't just stack kids like cordwood in every classroom.

"They understand what you're telling them," Nolen says. "They just don't want to understand."

As a rule, Nolen talks to parents who come in, and Baumgartner does the paperwork.

"I let Cheryl do the counter because I'm afraid I'll say something I shouldn't," says the soft-spoken, ever-smiling Baumgartner. "Every parent deserves a responsible answer to their questions. They don't know you've already answered it 119 times."

At Bromwell, choice is a year-round chore. It starts in September with constant requests for school tours, an average of two a week for as many as eight families each time.

"We have to figure out how to do that without disrupting the education of the kids who are already here," says Baumgartner, who has dealt with her share of desperate parents.

"They'll even offer to bribe you," she says. "They'll say, 'I'm from New York. There's always a way.' "

There is a way, but it's no sure thing.

For most schools, choice is open to anyone who can meet the district requirement of providing their own transportation. But at Bromwell, a school with a flood of applicants vying for a relative thimbleful of space, students who live outside the neighborhood are at the mercy of a computer-generated lottery.

Down at the district planning office, a name goes in and a number comes out. That determines everyone's place on the list, which is available about a month after the first round ends.

Even so, parents might have to wait until September to know whether their kids have a seat at Bromwell. Just because there are spots doesn't mean the principal has to fill them.

"Probably the part that's most confusing to parents is how we can say that there is not additional space for choice students if they perhaps are aware of other schools where there are 27 or 30 in a class," Bingham says. "We could have classes of 32 because there's plenty of demand. But that wouldn't make sense in terms of what our goals are for our school."

Smaller classes are a priority of Bromwell's Collaborative Decision Making team, which wants to keep the student-teacher ratio at a manageable 25 to 1.

"When we say a class is full, it might mean something different than it does at another school," Bingham says. "I try not to use the word 'full.' I try to use 'target class size.' "

"It's a balancing act," says Lowry, who works with principals to help the system run smoothly.

Say Bromwell has 20 open seats in kindergarten. The school is required to accommodate all children in its attendance area. So if Bingham fills his spaces with choice kids and suddenly has an influx of neighborhood kids over the summer, classes might end up overcrowded.

If Bingham sits on the spaces and they're still empty come September, he runs the risk of losing a teacher because his enrollment numbers are down. And what if he can't fill those slots because all his choice kids have given up and gone elsewhere?

No worry there.

"A school like that," Lowry says, "if we call up somebody, they're going to come."

© 2001 Denver Rocky Mountain News/Denver Publishing Co.
All rights reserved.

This article is copyrighted by the Denver Rocky Mountain News and may not be reproduced or republished without their permission. You can contact them for further information at the Rocky Mountain News website. We are grateful for their permission to post it here for the enrichment of our school community.