Michael Hancock: DPS Teachers Are Racist

In response to the resignation of Denver Public Schools Superintendent Susana Cordova, Denver mayor Michael Hancock (along with former mayor Federico Pena) wrote a letter blaming the “dysfunctional” school board for her departure and played the race card against Denver teachers for striking because she isn’t a white guy.

Beyond accusing the DPS board of being overtly hostile in working with Cordova, Hancock and Pena implied racist motivations behind the teacher strike of early 2019, indicating they suspected that the teachers wouldn’t have gone on strike if Cordova had been a white male. After listing DPS achievement improvements over the last 20 years (even though Cordova has only been superintendent since 2019), Hancock followed with what he apparently thought was Cordova’s primary qualification – being “the first Latina school superintendent in Denver.”

We can’t help but notice how Hancock and Pena call Denver a “Great City” in quotes. Do they mean to imply it’s not so great? In any case, Cordova’s exit and the mayors’ aggressive letter has only exacerbated the feud between these liberal politicians and the elected Denver School Board.

Hancock and Pena’s letter:

Aside from tweets from school board members responding, the board penned this response:

Thank you to everyone for your continued support and feedback as we navigate yet another difficult transition for Denver Public Schools. We are sending this statement to speak to Denverites who are made up of our students, our staff, our neighbors, and our community members.

We speak to you as duly elected members, selected by you, to represent your voice on the Denver Public Schools Board of Education. We are former teachers in DPS, we are organizers, we are parents of DPS students, we are bilingual. We are a recent alum, a reverend, a lawyer, a child of immigrants, and a former lieutenant governor. We are honored to lead the students of DPS into a future where all students can receive the best public education to thrive and learn. Students are always at the forefront of all we do.

We are grateful for the many comments, suggestions, and voices that have provided us with a lot of feedback and much to consider. We welcome the chance to talk with everyone including fellow elected leaders, once we have a process in place. We also want and encourage the many voices in our community, who care so deeply about our schools, to help us during this process. We always receive feedback from the communities we represent with openness and reflection. Our goal has remained steadfast; ensuring we have the best schools for the students in our community.

We have been working through the timeline for transition, naming an interim, and a process for a superintendent search. We ask for your patience keeping in mind we are in the midst of a pandemic. We will share the process with the community before any decisions are made. We will also announce an interim leader during the first week of December.

The Board has been clear that the Superintendent and her staff focus on the crisis priorities over the last 6 months in order to best serve our students and staff during this pandemic. In addition, the superintendent and the Board agreed to delay work on the next Denver Plan to best meet the urgent needs of our families in DPS. And, we know that this board believes in community voice as evidenced by the work we’ve taken on and how we’ve elevated students, teachers and principals voices. In addition we’ve highlighted the voices of the communities who elected us. We are committed to listening to all voices in our search, so that our students can have the public schools that they deserve.

All Board members were surprised and saddened by Susana Cordova’s departure. We wish her the best of luck in her new job in Dallas. Any superintendent taking over when she did would have stepped into a difficult position. When she started, DPS was in transition as we came off of 10 years of one administration. That meant there were challenging situations to manage, with new POVs When we hired her, we recognized that she had the skills and passion to work with DPS. As we face leadership changes, one thing that stays the same is our commitment to prioritizing our students.

How we spend our time over the next days and months will be critical. Any time we spend discussing external claims takes us away from our priorities focused on placing an interim superintendent to guide us through this transition; and reopening our schools for our students and teachers.

Like we always say to our students, be kind to each other. We are community and we will need each other. We call on everyone to model for our students how we can work together to build a strong public education system that we can all be proud of. We too always welcome constructive help and feedback. We particularly welcome help from any city leader, former school board member, and any concerned community leader to reopen our schools for a safe return in January.

Again, we look forward to finding the next great leader of DPS. We will continue to work towards our vision of grassroots decision making, and elevating the voices of our most precious stakeholders. We commit to seeing this moment as an opportunity to reflect on the past but not repeat it, and embrace the possibilities for all of our students. We will be providing updates to the community as we work to find a new leader for DPS.

Denver Public Schools Board of Education Response Statement

We’re not sure what kind of replacement Hancock and Pena would prefer – someone similarly racially qualified like Cordova, or a white guy that would prevent the racist teachers from striking again. We also can’t confirm that Hancock is actually in charge of his Twitter account, as it is possible he had his phone privileges revoked after he was caught inappropriately texting a subordinate female employee back in 2018.