For the third straight year, Denver Public Schools today is publishing on its web site a new set of report cards that track each school's performance. The report cards provide an in-depth look at each school, including a narrative description of the school's successes and challenges and a statistical portrait of the student body and staff.

Printed versions of the report cards will be available for 135 elementary, middle and high schools by the end of the month. Enough report cards are being printed for every student to bring one home. The report cards – both in print and on the web site – will be translated in Spanish. The district's web site can be found at www.denver.k12.co.us. Report cards are under the Schools section of the DPS web site.

The report cards include trend data on the Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) for as many years as scores are available for each grade level and subject. The cards also rank each school's performance on each CSAP score against all other schools in the district.

The CSAP results are also broken down in a variety of categories, including students tested in English, students tested in Spanish, students tested in English who speak English only, students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, students not eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, and students at the same school for two consecutive years, among others.

The report cards also provide an ethnic breakdown of the student body, information about teacher experience levels, faculty absenteeism rates, student attendance rates, discipline information, and more.

One key feature that distinguishes the DPS report cards from the state accountability reports (released for the first time in September 2001) are the narratives, which provide all parents and community members with a written overview of the school's strengths, educational atmosphere, goals, and strategies for improvement.