The American Indian Academy of Denver has been fighting to keep its doors open despite its small population of students.
The school has been fighting to keep its doors open despite its small population of students.
Indigenous families rallied in November saying the school's unique programs and teaching of Native languages such as Dineh and Lakota are helping their children thrive, CBS News reports.
The school's board of directors says changing from a charter school to an innovation school would enable the Academy to receive more funding from Denver Public Schools for needs such as special education and transportation.
And the school could serve any student in metro Denver with its indigenized curriculum.
"Our curriculum is amazing so moving to an innovation school would have some adjustments but not major adjustments to how we're already operating and specifically what we're already teaching," says AIAD parent and board member Veronica Lightning Horse Perez.
"Creating yet another program when the existing programs we have don't work doesn't feel reasonable."
But Denver Public Schools has offered programs for Native students before, yet Native graduation rates have remained low.
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Caroline Diehl is a serial social entrepreneur in the impact media space. She is Executive Chair and Founder of the UK’s only charitable and co-operatively owned national broadcast television channel Together TV, the leading broadcaster for social change runs a national TV channel in the UK and digital platform which helps people find inspiration to do good in their lives and communities.