The journey has begun. For some, it’s the beginning. For others, it’s the end of the line, at least for their time in public school. In Pueblo, the start of school began August 18th. It may take a few days, maybe a bit longer, but it’ll soon become the routine at least for the next eight and a half months.
For some Pueblo students, school year 2026-27 began in brand new digs. Pueblo South students walked into an old ‘new’ building. Over the summer, workers gave a facelift—a $2.3 million facelift—to the nearly seventy-year-old building. In addition to an entirely new cooling and heating system and new roof, District 60 school superintendent Barbara Kinzey said South High will also carry a new incarnation. It will henceforth serve students as an Advanced Placement and Fine Arts school.
Now, the challenge becomes, will the transformation be enough to keep them, South’s students, along with the rest of the city’s public school students, all the way through graduation.
While it is a fairly well accepted premise that a high school diploma is essential in a 21st century workforce, it is also the bare minimum for an increasingly complex world even if college is not the next step in an educational journey. But plenty of young people armed with only a high school diploma can still get along fine with a skill earned in a technical school. In fact, schools in Colorado and the rest of the nation have veered into a new lane offering students a vocational skill curriculum that includes things like IT, culinary arts, plumbing and other occupational skills needed in any century.
But while the goal is graduation, there is a difference between not graduating and simply dropping out. The former can be nothing more than failing to meet graduation requirements, failing required classes or even taking a gap year, a consideration not always considered in previous eras. Dropping out is exactly that; leaving school before completing required credits or earning a diploma. Put another way, all dropouts do not graduate. While students who don’t graduate have simply left school temporarily or failed to meet graduation criteria.
In school year 2025-26, Colorado’s statewide graduation rate was 85.6 percent, an improvement from the previous year and the highest in a decade.
In Pueblo’s District 60, total enrollment for all public schools is 12,107, of which 4,201 are enrolled in grades 9-12. If current trends continue or, as they have trended for the last five years, continue to climb, 2026 graduation rates will top last spring’s 84.2 percent. But current graduation rates reflect a steady increase from 2021, with 2022’s 76.6 percent the only year showing a decline. It should be noted that in 2022 the state and nation were only beginning to emerge from the pandemic. Anomalies in graduation rates were reflected across the nation. Dropout rates have also fluctuated in the same period with 2022’s 3.4 percent rate being the highest.
D60 Superintendent Kinzey attributes much of the improvement to a continued emphasis on a philosophical approach that includes “prioritizing improving literacy from PK-12 and across the curriculum.” Additionally, Kinzey gives great credit to the district for “expanding preschool to free, full-day options, designing and implementing a comprehensive enhanced scope and sequence,” along with a new assessment system and focus on attendance and social-emotional wellness. The district has also expanded its STREAM programming to its elementary schools, Science, Technology, Reading/Writing, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics.
Pueblo, southern Colorado’s largest school district, and the rest of the state have shown a dramatic improvement in graduation rates since 2010. In 2010, statewide graduation rates were a dismal 72.4 percent, nearly eight points below the national average. Today, national graduation rates in the class of 2026 are 88.5 percent with Alaska having the lowest at 79.8 percent. Vermont, Maine and Montana were the three states with the highest high school graduation rates coming in at 94.9 percent, 94.8 percent and 94.6 percent respectively.
Pueblo South High School principal DJ Johnson in welcoming this year’s new students sounded a note of optimism that his school and Pueblo D60 are taking nothing for granted in providing the best environments for students. It should be noted that in the last three years, the city has opened five brand new schools, including new versions of Pueblo East and Pueblo Centennial, all as modern as any in the state.
“When students walk into a school that is clean, modern, cared for and equipped with the tools they need to learn,” he told the Pueblo Chieftain, “we’re sending them a message: “You matter. Your education matters. Now, we expect great things from you.”
