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December 24, 2020
DENVER, COLORADO
A publication of
VOLUME 94 | ISSUE 7
Enrollment decline may devastate schools Pandemic has cut student numbers sharply, could hit budgets hard BY ERICA BREUNLIN AND JOHN FRANK THE COLORADO SUN
Westmoreland mainly treats patients in the Medical Center’s 20bed women’s unit. Some here were hospitalized after months of putting in 70 hours a week schooling
Enrollment in Colorado public schools dropped by close to 30,000 students this school year — the first year-to-year decrease the state’s public school system has reported in more than 30 years. Impacts of the pandemic drove enrollment numbers down, according to the Colorado Department of Education, which released preliminary enrollment figures on Dec. 15 after counting students in October. The overall drop in enrollment equates to a 3.3% decrease, with some of Colorado’s 178 school districts suffering dips of nearly 10% from enrollment during the 2019-20 school year. That could have serious consequences for the state’s public education system and districts’ budgets, which are largely determined by pupil counts, said Tracie Rainey, executive director of the Colorado School Finance Project. Depending on how the legislature decides to fund education during the next lawmaking session, districts could suffer significantly.
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SEE ENROLLMENT, P4
Dr. Patricia Westmoreland at the HealthONE Behavioral Health & Wellness Center Women’s Unit at The Medical Center of Aurora. She said, “Psychiatrists are not generally on the front lines of the COVID virus itself, but we are certainly treating the PHOTO BY MARC PISCOTTY effects of it.”
A psychiatrist absorbs her patients’ pain Doctor sees widespread mental health crises due to pandemic grinding on BY SUSAN GREENE COLORADO NEWS COLLABORATIVE
Dr. Patricia Westmoreland washes her hands 20 to 30 times each day she does rounds at the Medical Center of Aurora. That, she says, “doesn’t count sanitizing them who-knows-how-many times
more” as an extra step to protect her patients. Nor does it count scrubbing herself down in a hot shower when she goes home, before hugging her kids. “In prior years, I would have considered the rituals I now do phobic or obsessive. I would have said that’s crazy,” the psychiatrist says. “But now we’re living in this constant anxiety and hypervigilance where everything you do is dictated by fear of getting or spreading an illness you can’t see. “So who knows, really, what’s crazy anymore?”
INSIDE: VOICES: PAGE 6 | LIFE: PAGE 8 | CALENDAR: PAGE 9
CALL FOR HELP Whatever you are going through, crisis counselors and professionally trained peer specialists are available to help. Call the Colorado Crisis Service hotline at 1-844-493-TALK (8255). There is no wrong reason to reach out.
NEW TRADITIONS Families find new ways to celebrate the holidays P8