Four people have applied to fill a vacancy on the Adams 14 school board.
The four letters of interest that were submitted to the district, along with recommendation letters, have been posted online.
The community will have a chance to meet the candidates in a virtual town hall meeting and provide input to the board’s four current members on Thursday. The board will vote to appoint one of the four applicants on Tuesday.
The four candidates are all longtime community members:
- James Amador, who previously worked in various Denver Public School service departments, and most recently has served on the Adams 14 District Accountability Committee.
- Chance Cox, who works as a dispatcher, and is also the founder of The Nonprofit Garage of Denver.
- JoLeen Deaguero, who works as a clerk at the Adams County courthouse and is a parent of two high school students in Adams 14.
- Janet Estrada, who is a bilingual teacher at PREP Academy in Denver, and is also a parent of a preschool student in Adams 14.
One of the letters of recommendation for Deaguero comes from a teacher who is on the board of the district’s teachers union. Union leaders said this was not an official endorsement from the association.
Estrada also has notable recommendation letters from state Sen. Dominick Moreno, who previously served on the district school board, and from Denver Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca.
The board vacancy was created when former member Regina Hurtado moved out of the district’s boundaries and had to resign her board position. Hurtado had been elected in 2019. The person appointed to the seat will serve until the next election, this November, at which point voters would elect who gets to serve out the remainder of the term.
Adams 14 school board members have been overseeing the management of the district by the for-profit MGT Consulting, and its efforts to improve student achievement under state orders.
The school board is also about to begin a search for a superintendent. MGT has filled that role for about two years, but has planned to slowly hand back responsibilities and management to the district.
Thursday’s town hall to meet the candidates starts at 5 p.m. via Zoom. The link and passcode are available on the district’s website.
