Frequently Asked Questions
To meet community demand and support our programmatic growth.
Our school community has so much to celebrate! Over the past several years, our crew has continuously been recognized at the local, state, and national level for academic achievement and growth. We’ve also racked up a number of remarkable individual and group accomplishments in the arts and athletics, as well as loads of college credits and college scholarships. Our success means our program is in high-demand. Mindfully expanding our offerings will help us continue to offer the high-quality experiences Renaissance is known for, while meeting the growing demands of our community.
Expanding our program is intended to:
Meet community demand for elementary grade levels beginning in Pre-K and Kindergarten, which significantly exceeds what the current elementary school can accommodate. Our neighboring Renaissance Elementary consistently has 60+ students each year who apply for enrollment in Kindergarten and are waitlisted.
Offer additional capacity in some current grade levels to better meet the continuously growing demand for our program in Grades 6-12.
Leverage economies of scale to increase academic and elective offerings by hiring additional faculty, enhancing programs, and offering a broader range of courses and electives.
Provide robust facilities for academic excellence and programming in athletics, the arts, science, technology, engineering, business, and beyond, ensuring all students have access to the tools and environments they need to excel.
The first phase of opening grades Pre-K through 5 and upgraded facilities is anticipated to take place in Fall 2027 or Fall 2028.
An initial step in this process is for Renaissance to submit our application to expand programming to the DCSD Charter Application Review Team (CART) by April 1st, 2025. DCSD’s team reviews the application and submits their recommendation to the DCSD Board of Directors. The Board of Directors reviews and approves applications; voting is scheduled for the end of May.
Upon approval by DCSD, the Renaissance team will move forward with the next steps to take the vision from planning to reality. The target dates for the first expansion phase are Fall 2027 or Fall 2028.
Castle Rock area.
A specific site has not yet been selected to meet our off-site expansion needs. However, all sites being considered are in the Castle Rock area. We will always remain one school, whether we have one or two sites, so proximity to our current building is being prioritized in this process. Particularly because this expansion is envisioned as a phased process, specific determinations about which grade levels will ultimately remain in the current building and which may be at a new site have not yet been determined. Families will be an important part of the conversation surrounding those determinations as the process progresses!
As we embark on this adventure, we remain committed to staying true to our mission and small-school culture of crew. It is our core belief that our mission is best realized in a small school focused on a culture of crew. As we grow, we aim to achieve the “Goldilocks” of school size, allowing us to offer our students exceptional facilities and opportunities, while preserving the close-knit, supportive community that has defined us.
Our growth is intended to move us toward achieving our mission in a way that meets the needs of our community in both the short and long-term. All decision points along the way will be filtered through our ability to best achieve our mission to empower students to become modern learners who are critical thinkers, problem solvers, communicators, collaborators, and creative innovators.
As we move forward with these plans, we’re mindful of the unpredictability of building costs and the uncertainty of state and federal funding at this time. We are dedicated to maintaining the high standards of quality and culture that our students and families value, and we will continue to carefully evaluate the financial landscape to ensure that this expansion is both viable and in the best interest of our community. Our phased approach contemplates several contingency plans and varied timelines in the event things don’t go as planned.
Demand for the current elementary school (Renaissance Elementary Magnet School -REMS) significantly exceeds what they can accommodate. An additional elementary school site will allow for more families to access this programming!
Long term, the plan is for the current 6th-12th campus to serve as a middle school building. However, the shift from this building serving grades 6-12 to serving 6-8 is still several years out.
Renaissance Secondary School offers an innovative educational program that includes elements of Expeditionary Learning, Project-Based Learning, and Adventure Education. As students engage in authentic learning projects, students have the opportunity to design, build, and create as they would in the real world, often taking them outside the confines of the school building and the traditional school schedule. Some have called this type of learning “Deeper Learning” - to learn more, visit: http://www.hewlett.org/programs/education/deeper-learning.
As a charter school, Renaissance Secondary School has its own Board of Directors which provides governance and oversight. The board works in partnership with the District, but our school has received waivers for many of the policies of the DCSD Board of Education. The District offers “purchased services” to charter schools, like annual state testing, school nurse services, student records, and more.
A charter school is a public, tuition-free (although fees can be charged) school granted authority to operate under a contract, or charter, with the school board. Like other public schools, charter schools are still held accountable to state standards. The school is also held accountable to its charter in a renewal process with the school board. However, the school is governed by a board of directors rather than the DCSD school board.
Charter schools receive "per pupil funding" that is provided by the State to educate each student. The Douglas County School District keeps a portion of this funding in exchange for the purchased services that are required for the successful operation of the school. Renaissance Secondary School’s board must pay for staffing, facility costs and school operations from the remaining funds. To build the school facility, the Board sought private funding which will be repaid using a portion of the per pupil funding, donations, funds raised and grants.
Renaissance Secondary School will be a natural progression from Renaissance Elementary School. It will maintain the elementary school’s commitment to innovative and expeditionary learning and its strong school culture. However, because Renaissance Secondary School will include higher grades with older students, the learning will look somewhat different. Students will take more responsibility for their own learning. They will engage in more projects in the community, they will create more sophisticated projects, and their learning will be more authentic. Renaissance is not, however, permitted to grant preference to Renaissance Elementary School students in the lottery and Renaissance Elementary School students will not be automatically admitted to Renaissance Secondary.
The unique and innovative programming at Renaissance Secondary School requires additional funding in the form of student fees. Renaissance utilizes a once per year flat fee to cover educational program needs, rather than asking parents to pay fees "here and there" throughout the year for items such as adventure education, fieldwork transportation, electives, and technology fees.
The fees at Renaissance Secondary School are roughly equal to fees at some other charter schools, including DCS Montessori in Castle Pines.
~ Renaissance Secondary School is committed to ensuring no student is excluded from attending based on an inability to pay fees. Scholarships are available to families in need. ~
Current annual fees total $1200 per student and may be paid in installments.
Student fees are non-refundable once the school year begins.
For more information on fees, go to our Fees page.
Yes. The 10 principles of Expeditionary Learning created by Kurt Hahn remain at the heart of the school’s educational program. The Outward Bound organization is no longer affiliated with Expeditionary Learning, but the educational principles of both organizations continue in both the academic and adventure education programs.
Renaissance Secondary School has an adventure education program in which all students will be required to participate in outdoor adventure activities for one overnight trip and one or more day trips. Your child does not need to like being in the outdoors to benefit from the program.
The purpose of the adventure education program is to challenge students by placing them outside of their comfort zones and showing them that they can accomplish more than they thought they could. In fact, the students who benefit the most are often the students who are challenged the most. For more information, please visit our Adventure Education page.