DENVER — After weeks of school districts and parents sharing frustrations over the state's launch of universal pre-K in Colorado school leaders around Colorado finally got a chance to bring those concerns right to the state.
The concerns range from issues using and registering students to suddenly losing full days of learning for kids.
During a listening session Thursday afternoon, frustrations quickly bubbled over from school leaders who said the system isn't working as school leaders with multiple districts came forward.
The meeting was focused on Bridgecare, which is how students are registered and matched for pre-K, as well as deciding how much funding school programs receive.
And educators were honest, telling the state their programs are losing needed funding under this new system, especially for special education.
When it comes to matching and registering kids, they said the state's system isn't working and its schools and parents are left scrambling.
"We've been working with the Bridgecare system dating back to February and we continue to have the same issue repeated over and over again. We have families being added, families being dropped off, families being readded, families being dropped off," said Jeremy Burmeister, from the Platte Valley School District. "It does not allow for us to keep track of what our numbers are supposed to be within the Bridgecare system. We know what we see every day since we started school last Tuesday in terms of our ratios. Our ratios in our classes do not match what's in the Bridgecare system, it does not match what we have in our online student information system. That is a problem."
"The inability for us to be able to work within the Bridgecare system is preventing us from doing our job," Burmeister said.
Tammy Johnson, director of special education with Uncompahgre Board of Cooperative Educational Services said her staff are having to do all the work to get their kids into Bridgecare to the point where it's not allowing them to do their jobs.
"Every district in the state is paying for this and mostly, it's our children and our staff members that are struggling through this. So no – it's not a systems issue on our part, it's a systems issue on the part of Bridgecare and the Bridgecare staff and the planning staff for not listening to us when they should have previously," Johnson said.
9NEWS reached out to the Colorado Department of Education about concerns raised in this listening session, they said, "The Colorado Department of Education is absolutely committed to ensuring preschool students with disabilities receive all the services they are entitled to under federal law to prepare them for success in school. We appreciate the opportunity to talk directly with districts and will be working with our partners at the Department of Early Childhood to address districts’ concerns related to serving students with disabilities."
The Colorado Department of Early Childhood said, "CDEC and CDE’s joint listening session today affirmed our commitment to working with superintendents across the state towards a free universal preschool system that works for Colorado kids and families, saves families more of their hard-earned money, and was approved by the majority of voters. Superintendents are key partners in all of our programs, and we wanted to acknowledge their efforts as the school year kicks off. Listening to provider experiences and potential ways we can continue working together to address their issues is key to the success of free universal preschool – and to the success of children in every grade, including preschool. CDEC and CDE look forward to using the information from today’s listening session as we move together to provide free universal preschool to Colorado’s kids and hardworking parents."
As for questions raised during the listening session, state education leaders said they expect to have answers for districts hopefully by next week.
Due to the lawsuit filed against the state by six districts over the universal pre-K program and its launch, they said they won't be able to address every concern raised by school leaders.
SUGGESTED VIDEOS: Education stories from 9NEWS