Anticipating at least $42 million in state funding cuts for the next school year, Denver Public Schools administrators are calling for salary freezes, a reduction of 3.5 percent in every school budget and less money for special education.

No widespread teacher layoffs are expected for 2010-11, but targeted layoffs are likely, said David Suppes, DPS chief operating officer, in a presentation to the school board Wednesday.

"It's impossible to think at this level of cuts there won't be jobs lost," Suppes said.

Throughout the state, school districts are beginning difficult discussions about their budgets as Colorado faces its worst revenue downturn since the Great Depression.

A quiz.

In what years were the following written:

A) "Racial gaps in suspensions — Black public-school students in Colorado are nearly three times as likely to face serious discipline as their white peers, a disparity that is persistently growing despite efforts to curb it. . . . Expressed as a rate, 18 of every 100 black students and 11 of 100 Latino students faced serious discipline, compared with 6.5 out of 100 white students."

B) "Minority school suspensions a shocker — Suspensions last year of more than 47,000 students, including disproportionate numbers of black and Hispanic males, have prompted educators and policymakers to ask why. Nearly half of all black males in Colorado's middle and high schools were suspended last year, along with nearly a third of Hispanic males and one in every six white males."

C) "Suspensions impact some children more than others. While the largest numbers of suspended children are white, proportionately suspensions hurt more children who are black, poor, older and male. Most striking is the disparate suspension of black schoolchildren. They are suspended at twice the rate of any other group."

Denver Public Schools tonight will embark on a new era in what may be the district's most pivotal school board meeting in decades.

The old board, with three members about to vacate their seats, will vote on a host of ambitious reforms recommended by the administration, including turnaround plans for six schools and placement of new charter schools.

Minutes after that vote, a new board will be sworn in — adding three new faces to the seven-member board.

Speculation is rife over what both boards will do.

Will the old board approve all of the controversial reforms? Will the new board overturn the old board's fresh decisions? And which member will be voted in as school board president — Nate Easley Jr., Jeannie Kaplan or incumbent Theresa Peña?

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About 40 parents, teachers and others weighed in Monday on reform plans by Denver Public Schools — criticizing and applauding the district's proposed changes.

The DPS administrators' recommendations aim to improve schools, close failing programs and add charter schools throughout the district.

The school board votes on the recommendations Nov. 30.

Until then, the board begins a process of mulling over the recommendations and listening to feedback.

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Denver Public Schools officials today recommended sweeping changes to some of the district's lowest-performing schools — and a change in how charter schools operate.

District officials want three charter middle schools to become "boundary schools," which means they must accept every child in the neighborhood the schools serve.

The move could silence a long-running criticism about charters schools serving select groups of students.

The debate of charter schools vs. neighborhood schools became a focus of campaigns during Denver's recent school board election..

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The true tenor of Denver's new school board may be revealed Nov. 30, minutes after new members are sworn in and the officers are elected.

The board, with three new members who won their seats in a feisty campaign framed as a battle of charter schools versus neighborhood schools, will be presented with a challenge.

Does it reverse a decision made minutes before by the old board about turnaround strategies for three district and three charter schools, which could be as controversial as closing the school programs and replacing them with charters?

Or does it move on to new business?

Reversal, observers said, would send shockwaves through the education community.

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Voters on Tuesday shifted the balance of power on the Denver Public Schools board, creating a majority that is less sympathetic to charter schools.

The seven-member DPS board, heralded nationally for pushing academic and administrative reforms, now is effectively split 4-3 along ideological lines, with the minority supporting reforms pushed by Superintendent Tom Boasberg and his predecessor, U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet.

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