a jolt, then a sigh of relief

saturday
November 28, 2009
THE NEWS
TODAY
75 cents ❘ Informing the Pikes Peak region since 1872 ❘ gazette.com
local
Father accused in
Security shooting
An argument over chores
led to his son’s death at a
Thanksgiving gathering,
authorities say. A3
Find a Christmas
tree in the forest
Select areas of Pike
National Forest will be open
to tree cutting starting
Monday. Each permit is $10,
and the limit is five permits
per person. A3
TIP JAR
Get a jump
on shipping
At Pak Mail, 4419 Centennial Blvd., you can
pick up a card with a
list of holiday shipping
deadlines for all major
carriers, plus shipping
tips. Includes a coupon
for $3 off one UPS or
FedEx shipment at the
store.
markets
a jolt, then a sigh of relief
Fears a Dubai crisis may trigger meltdown recede
By STEVENSON JACOBS
The Associated Press
—
Dubai’s debt crisis rattled world financial markets Friday,
raising concerns that some banks
could further tighten lending and
stall the global economic recovery.
The possible spillover effects cenNEW YORK •
tered on fears that international
banks could suffer big losses if
Dubai’s investment arm defaulted
on its $60 billion debt.
Stock and commodity markets
tumbled in New York, London and
Asia as investors flocked to the U.S.
dollar as a safe haven.
in business
Gauging the effect on the Dow will have to
wait until next week. B6
But earlier concerns that the crisis
might trigger another financial meltdown seemed to ease after some analysts downplayed the risks for U.S.
banks, which are thought to have
little exposure to the Middle Eastern
city-state.
U.S. stocks fell sharply but rebounded from their lows as investors
concluded that the damage might be
contained.
“I don’t think the collateral damage is going to be that great,” said
—
sEE maRKEts • PagE 15
BuIldINg
Times are tough.
Know of a great
bargain, helpful job
resource or clever way
to save money?
Email bill.radford@
gazette.com.
about
atlas
PREP
classes
Opened in August
with seven teachers and 100 fifthgraders (20 have
dropped out).
There are four
classrooms with
20 students each.
As this year’s
students move
on, Atlas will add
classes behind
them until it has
grades 5-8.
location
1602 S. Murray
Blvd. in Harrison
School District 2.
world
At least 25 killed
inTIP
train derailment
fINaNcINg
As a public
charter school,
Atlas Prep gets
public money
based on the
student population. The school
also has received
$100,000 from
the Daniels
Fund and grants
from the Walton
Foundation and
El Pomar.
JAR
The Russian express train
was carrying passengers
from Moscow to St. Petersburg. A15
U.N. gets tough
on Iranian nukes
Russia and China join the
chorus in scolding Iran,
with the threat of sanctions mentioned. A15
contact
health
Diabetes expected
to double by ’34
That’s if the percentage
of Americans who are
obese stays the same. The
cost of treating the disease
in that time will almost
triple, a report finds. A11
sports
No. 5 CC blanks
Alaska-Anchorage
The Tigers scored twice
on a power play, won 5-0. B1
Woods injured
in car crash
Tiger Woods was in and
out of consciousness initially, but he was released
from the hospital. B2
392-7603
an atlaS mInD
diFFerenT
By desiGn:
A rigorous
curriculum
and emphasis on social
skills set
Atlas Prep
apart.
By CAROL MCGRAW
S
carol.mcgraw@gazette.com
—
onya Felder was hurrying into a grocery
store in the spring when Julian Flores
approached her, clipboard in hand.
“I thought, ‘What does this guy want?’” the
single mother of two recalled recently.
What he wanted was to ask a simple question: Did she have a fifth-grader who might
want to go to a new charter school serving
diverse and economically disadvantaged
students?
It would be rigorous, Flores told her.
Students would attend school from 8 a.m.
to 5 p.m. The school year would be 190 days
instead of the typical 180.
The goal, he said, was to close the achievement gap between low-income and minority
students and their more affluent peers and
instill in the students a drive to go to college.
Felder was intrigued. She did, indeed, have
a daughter about to enter fifth grade, 10-yearold Shayla, and she wasn’t happy with
Shayla’s schooling.
—
sEE atlas • PagE 8
black friday
nation
Divorce rate edges
higher in military
Lengthy deployments are
taking a toll. A14
weather, b8
early birds get the bargains
Before sun rose, flocks
of shoppers descended
High 53 • Low 23
The Gazette
—
A cold front is
heading our
way tonight. It
will be wintry on Sunday.
The big spending day began before dawn. Nothing
could stop the hordes of bargain hunters determined to
jump-start the holiday shopping season.
The day after Thanksgiving is called Black Friday because it’s the day that retailers hope to pound their way
into the profit margin.
By 4:15 a.m., the Old Navy
store on North Powers Boulevard had a full parking lot
and customers lined up dozens deep at cash registers.
“It’s a fun challenge,” shopper Nicole Cappiello said.
Vol. 138 • No. 250
Copyright © 2009
Freedom Colorado
Information, Inc.
Daily
—
sEE BlacK fRIdaY • PagE 2
CaleNdar > breakout 2
busINess > IN sports
crashers slipped past
screen, Met ObaMas
By LARRy MARGASAK
The Associated Press
—
MAriAh TAuGer, The GAzeTTe
Verna Maul and her husband, Gus, packed the trunk of
their car with just-purchased merchandise outside The
Citadel mall Friday. This is the Mauls’ 10th year of shopping Black Friday, though Verna is out earlier than Gus.
in business
Across the nation, stores see
signs of life as shoppers seek
out good deals. B6
NatIoN & world > a6
Don’t miss granD opening savings
going on now!
• corner of woodmen and PowerS •
online > in depth
●
For a look at Black
Friday as the clock was
ticking, go to gazette.com
obItuarIes > a16
opINIoN > a17
KirK sPeer
The GAzeTTe
white house
Secret Service admits
oversight on couple
By JOhN C. ENSSLiN
AND ANDREA BROWN
aboVe
left:
Atlas Prepatory school
fifth-grader
shayla Felder,
right, and her
deskmate,
dejah Fitts,
studied flash
cards held by
a classmate
before a quiz
in their class.
WasHINgtON • The Virginia couple who crashed
a presidential dinner met
President Barack Obama
in the receiving line, the
White House said Friday,
as a “deeply concerned
and embarrassed” Secret
Service acknowledged its
officers failed to check
whether the couple was
on the guest list.
The White House released a photo showing
the Salahis in the receiving line in the Blue Room
with Obama and Indian
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, in whose hon-
movIes > breakout 2
or the dinner was held.
Obama and Michaele
Salahi are smiling as she
grasps his right hand
with both of hers as her
husband, Tareq, looks on.
Singh is standing to the
left of Obama.
The Secret Service this
week had said the president was not in danger
because the couple — like
others at the dinner —
had gone through magnetometers. But in light
of their proximity to the
president, no such claim
was made Friday.
The Salahis were not on
the guest list and should
have been prohibited
from entering Tuesday’s
—
sEE cRasHERs • PagE 9
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A8
❘ the gazette ❘ Saturday, November 28, 2009
local
atlas: Officials hope to open a high school
Atlas
Prepatory School
Executive
Director
Zachary
McComsey
greeted
students as
they began
the school
day in October.
A DAY IN THE LIFE
The days at Atlas Preparatory School are long, but time flies
for the students because of the fast-paced scheduling. We
spent the day recently with fifth-grader Shayla Felder and
her classmates to get a feel for their experience at this Harrison School District 2 charter school.
7:30 To 8:30 A.m.
Shayla arrives at the school by bus. Most charter schools don’t
provide transportation, but Atlas considers it a priority so that
economically disadvantaged students can always get there. She’s
wearing her school uniform — khaki slacks and a gray sweat shirt.
The school provides one set free, along with all school supplies.
On the bus is Julian Flores, a school founder, who takes his turn
as bus monitor. “We expect them to act respectfully the minute
they are in our care,” he says.
Shayla and the other students head to the cafeteria. Ninety
percent of the students receive free or reduced-price breakfasts
and lunches. In the cafeteria, students eat, then work quietly on a
vocabulary puzzle. If they figure out the word and hear it used by
a teacher, they win points. Today, the word is “meddling.”
Heidy Shinn, dean of student life, raises her fist, thumb down —
the school signal for quiet. “Scholars, remember your voice level,”
she says.
Manners are a big deal here. The students are referred to as
“ladies” and “gentlemen,” “professionals” or “scholars.”
“We are working to raise academics to a high level, and behavior directly influences that.” Flores says.
The scholars quietly head for their homerooms, through hallways festooned with college banners.
8:25 To 8:40 A.m.
Homerooms are named after the teachers’ colleges. Shayla’s
group of 20 is called Stonehill, after Nora Duane’s alma mater.
There is a Stonehill banner on the bulletin board, as well as a sign
that reads, “College Prep for All.” Students take field trips to local
colleges, where they are teamed with mentors.
The fifth-graders are referred to as the “Class of 2021” — the
year they would graduate from college.
PHOTOS BY KIRK SPEER, THE GAZETTE
From pAgE 1
—
So when Atlas Preparatory
School opened in August in
Harrison School District 2,
Shayla was part of the inaugural class of about 100 fifthgraders.
Atlas is patterned after several innovative schools nationwide that have received
accolades for their educational successes.
At one of them, KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy in Denver, students advance two
grade levels in a year, in part
because of the longer school
hours.
Beyond adding classroom
time, Atlas is breaking the
mold in other ways:
• Its administrators and
board of directors have been
professionally trained to
help the charter succeed;
at most charter schools, the
boards are made up of parent volunteers.
• Students don’t use textbooks but are taught through
a curriculum created by the
teachers.
• Those who get in trouble
aren’t suspended because, as
Flores said, “they wouldn’t
be learning.”
• The school provides
transportation for all its students to guarantee they’ll be
in class.
• Good manners and proper behavior are mandatory.
The experiment begins
On the first day of school,
Shayla was up an hour earlier than usual and had her
uniform on.
At the end of the week,
Felder asked what she had
learned that first week.
“Failure is not an option,”
Shayla happily replied.
Even now, with the new-
ness worn off, Shayla comes
home excited and talks at
length about her days.
“I kept waiting for some
big glitch, it being a new
school and all,” Felder said.
“I thought, ‘something is going to happen’.”
But no. Shayla is a completely different student now.
“She talks different. She has
all this self-esteem. She does
all her homework,” Felder
said. “She even says things
to her brother like ‘Don’t be
disrespectful,’ instead of getting in a big argument. She
told me they don’t let kids
make fun of other kids at
Atlas. She likes to wear uniforms because no one picks
on her about her clothes.”
But it’s not all roses.
“It’s not an easy school;
they expect a lot,” Felder
said.
Twenty students quit after just a couple of weeks.
Some moved away, but others couldn’t adapt to the
academic and behavioral
expectations and the longer
hours, Flores said.
Others dropped out because of issues associated
with at-risk families. For
example, Felder said, one
mother pulled her daughter
out because she needed her
to baby-sit the younger children when they got out of
school earlier.
Flores said some felt the
school was too regimented.
“Parents told us their kids
complained because they
couldn’t go out to recess
if they didn’t finish their
homework.
They
complained because friends in
other schools got out two
hours earlier and they didn’t
have time for fun.”
Felder has a different take
on it.
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Shayla Felder and several classmates hoped to answer
a question posed to them during their fictional-literature class at Atlas Prep.
The goal of Atlas is to
close the achievement
gap between low-income and minority students and their more
affluent peers, and
instill in the students a
drive to go to college.
“I can’t imagine being upset
because Shayla was studying
at school instead of running
around the neighborhood or
playing video games,” she
said.
A lot of catching-up to do
Felder especially likes that
Shayla’s homeroom teachers
call her every two weeks to
discuss her progress and ask
if there are any concerns.
They work closely to keep
Shayla on track.
Staff members will show
up at a family’s door to find
out why a student might be
a habitual no-show.
The school’s seven teachers have a big challenge,
and not just because they
have long days in the classroom, followed by evenings
of planning.
On average, the school’s
students are below the 28th
percentile nationally on
achievement tests.
At their former schools,
fewer than half were proficient in reading and math
on state tests, and fewer
than a third were proficient
in writing.
“It means most of our
school is one to two years
behind in core subjects, and
they’re only 10 years old,”
Flores said.
But Atlas is geared toward
catching kids up quickly
in core subjects, as well as
building their character
and the academic and social
skills they’ll need to graduate from college.
Erin Wahler, a teacher for
five years, joined Atlas because she was disillusioned
with
traditional
public
schools.
“I felt that no matter the
gains, they were negated
the next year because there
wasn’t a cohesiveness of
goals. It’s awesome at Atlas. Everyone is on the same
page, including the students,” she said.
Atlas officials hope to add
a high school so students
won’t be thrust back into
schools that don’t have the
same rigor or goals.
If the high school doesn’t become a reality by the time this
year’s fifth-graders reach high
school, the administrators
say they will find them similar educational opportunities
and scholarship money.
Although the school hasn’t
been open long, it can already boast of reaching one
goal: boosting interest in college — at least where Shayla
is concerned.
College hadn’t been on her
radar before, Felder said.
Now, Shayla frequently talks
about her aspirations.
“I’m going to go to University of Northern Colorado,”
Shayla said matter-of-factly.
8:40 To 10:20 A.m.
The bell rings, but at Atlas, the teachers change classrooms, not
the students. This cuts transition time to about three minutes,
leaving more time for studies.
Literature teacher Erin Wahler arrives with a cart filled with
class materials. Students stand with hands clasped behind their
backs and greet her with, “Good morning, Miss Wahler.”
“Good morning, scholars,” she replies.
Class starts with a quiz on the previous day’s work to settle the
children in immediately. That’s followed by instruction, discussion
and working in small groups. At the end of the class, students use
remote-control devices to send answers to another short quiz to
the teacher’s computer.
Wahler can immediately see if the class understood the lesson
— and which students may need more help later at the homework
center. It also determines how much time she might have to
devote to the subject again the next day.
The teachers keep a “student dashboard” — an online tracking system that shows students’ day-to-day status by subject,
including academic progress, behavior, absences, homework and
assessment scores. It helps teachers analyze students’ problems
and successes.
Literature over, the students clean up their work space, stand
up and say, “Thank you, Miss Wahler.”
At 9:40 a.m., the writing teacher arrives. The students chirp,
“Good morning, Miss Fitzsimmons,”
10:20 To 10:35 A.m.
Break time. Students line up. To get out the door, they have to
show their completed classroom work to their teacher. Now and
over lunch, they do what kids all over do at recess: jump rope,
play basketball and four square, and draw on the sidewalk with
chalk.
10:35 A.m. To 2:25 p.m.
It’s back to class, where Shayla and the other students tackle
math and science.
In all classes, they must raise their hand when the instructor
asks a question, whether they know the answer or not. This keeps
every student engaged. A shaking hand means they are excited to
provide the answer; a calm hand means they are fairly confident;
a closed fist means they need help. Sometimes, the teacher calls
on those with closed fists to walk them through their confusion.
When one girl answers a question in a barely audible voice,
science teacher Sarah Alexander says, “Use your confident voice.”
The girl tries again, successfully. The school’s goals include
developing students who can express themselves confidently
anywhere.
Alexander reminds two boys up front to “track” — politely look
at who is speaking, whether it’s a teacher or student. There are
no snickers or laughter when mistakes are made. Treating others
well is a must.
12:15 To 1 p.m.
Lunch and recess.
1 To 3:25 p.m.
The afternoon is taken up with math procedures, historical
literature and art (or another enrichment class).
Students are motivated by weekly “paychecks.” They are paid
in chromes — bonus points received for good behavior and good
work — and they can lose chromes for bad behavior. There is a
catalog of things they can “buy” with their chromes, ranging from
a smiley-face plastic ring (10 chromes) to having a teacher make a
special lunch just for them (420 chromes) to a college T-shirt (600
chromes).
Shayla has more than 400 chromes.
3:25 To 5 p.m.
Everyone is in the homework center, where snacks are handed
out and students quietly work through their assignments. There
is plenty of homework — maybe three to four times what they
had in other schools. Teachers are available to answer questions
and provide more detailed tutoring. The six students with the
lowest grades in the various class subjects get even more intense
academic help four times a week in another part of the building.
Even with this special homework time, Shayla says she usually
has more to do at home.
5 p.m.
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