Pikes Peak State College Leaves ERBOCES, Leaving It with One Member

Pikes Peak State College is leaving.

That’s the headline. But the real story isn’t just that a community college is cutting a cord; it’s that the entity it’s leaving is now teetering on the edge of irrelevance.

Education ReEnvisioned BOCES, or ERBOCES, was built on a singular, provocative idea: it would authorize and support Riverstone Academy, the organization’s own leaders called it Colorado’s “first public Christian school.” Now, with Riverstone closed and two major members walking away, the cooperative is down to its last member.

If ERBOCES can’t find another partner by Aug. 15, it dies.

The latest casualty is Pikes Peak State College in Monument. Matt Radcliffe, the college’s executive director of marketing and communications, confirmed in an email that the institution is “resigning its membership” effective Aug. 15. He didn’t offer a reason. He didn’t explain the strategy. He just stated the fact.

This leaves ERBOCES with just one member: School District 49 in El Paso County.

That’s a problem. Colorado has 21 BOCES organizations, and they all operate on a simple rule of two. You need at least two members to function. Two school districts, or one district and one higher education institution. Without that second pair of hands, the hub has nothing to distribute. The resources become isolated. The model breaks.

The question is whether ERBOCES can survive the next few weeks, or if this is a slow-motion collapse.

Ken Witt, the executive director of ERBOCES, didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment about the organization’s future. Silence from the top is telling. When the leader of the ship doesn’t speak, you assume the crew is worried.

This isn’t the first exit. Just weeks ago, Elizabeth School District voted unanimously to cut ties. They had joined ERBOCES in January, a bold move for a small district looking to align with a unique educational model. They stayed for six months, then left.

School District 49’s board considered doing the same during a June 11 meeting. They voted to stay, at least for one more year. Lori Thompson, the board secretary and an ERBOCES board member herself, told the board that other districts were “thinking about signing onto ERBOCES.”

It’s a pitch. It’s a hope. But it’s not a guarantee.

The controversy that has plagued ERBOCES since day one is Riverstone Academy. Located in Pueblo County, outside the immediate bounds of the districts that make up ERBOCES, Riverstone opened its doors about 10 months ago. It was the flagship project, the proof of concept for a publicly funded Christian school.

Then, in early June, Riverstone was ordered to close its building due to health and safety concerns.

The school is gone. The model is unproven. And now, the financial and administrative backbone that was supposed to support it is losing its limbs.

For the folks watching the education landscape in Colorado, this is a cautionary tale about niche experiments. You can build a unique model, you can attract initial interest, but if the core asset closes and your partners start leaving, the structure becomes fragile fast.

ERBOCES needs a new member. It needs a second district or a second college to step in before Aug. 15. If they don’t, the “first public Christian school” cooperative becomes a historical footnote — a single-member organization that tried to change the rules of engagement and ran out of partners.

Will School District 49 hold the line, or will they wait for the rest of the state to decide if Riverstone’s closure was a fluke or a warning?

As Radcliffe put it, simply and without fanfare, the college is resigning. The ball is now in ERBOCES’s court.