'Innovation schools' succeed doing things their own way

DENVER - It's rare when those responsible for enforcing the rules suddenly say it's O.K. to break them, but for the first time in Colorado history, public schools are being granted a special status as "innovation schools" to do things their own way.

Manual High School and Montclair Elementary were the first to earn the distinction.

This all started when Senate President Peter Groff thought it would be a smart idea to let some schools make decisions on their own instead of running them through a school board.

Last year, a law was passed creating a path for a new kind of school.

When Principal Shannon Haggerman took over Montclair Elementary, it was dying. She says half the kids had left.

Now, she's got more than 400 to watch over, thanks to what she calls being "unplanned."

"We have had some tremendous success over the past five years and so there have been some firsts for us along the way," Haggerman said.

Five years ago, Haggerman turned to the neighborhood, going door to door for guidance on the work ahead, building a tailor-made school with an emphasis on the arts.

Now, she and the teachers want to continue their reforms without having to follow certain state guidelines or go through the school board.

"Sometimes, that can slow you down and if you're trying to reform a school, you don't always have the luxury of time," Haggerman said.

First grade teacher Carey Taylor said: "I'm with them every day, Monday through Friday and I know what they need and what they want."

That's why representatives from the school were at the State Board of Education on Thursday.

"Why would we let external circumstances interfere with the work that we're clear we need to do," Manuel High School's Principal Rob Stein said.

Haggerman and Stein want to be the first innovative schools, and hopefully, become a role model for other schools.

"Because the whole purpose of innovation schools is to get rid of bureaucracy," Elaine Gantz Berman of the State Board of Education said.

They want to be the first to show that sometimes things unplanned go exactly as planned.

The innovation status gives a school more freedom than a term talked about a lot last year: autonomy. Innovation schools can waive state rules and union agreements.

A leader of the Denver teacher's union says it has no official stance on the innovation issue.

The State Board of Education expects a comprehensive analysis at each school in about a year or so to determine if having innovation status truly makes a difference in school performance.