Glossary of Terms and Acronyms

AP: Advanced Placement, college-level credit courses offered at high schools 

ASP: Academics Support Plan   

CDE: Colorado Department of Education 

CTE: Career and Technical Education 

EAI: Educational Adequacy Index 

ECE: Early Childhood Education 

ESL: English as a Second Language 

ESSA: Every Student Succeeds Act 

FCI: Facility Condition Index 

FRL: Free and reduced lunch students 

GIS: Geographic Information Systems 

GT: Gifted and Talented 

IB: International Baccalaureate 

MLO: Mill Levy Override 

PLC: Professional Learning Community 

PRE-K: Pre-school and kindergarten 

SEL: Social and Emotional Learning 

STEAM: Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math 

SPED: Special Education 

STEM: Science, Technology, Engineering and Math  

ASP:  Academic Support Plan. A long term strategic plan for improving school buildings through repairs, renovations or re-building.

Capacity:  The number of students a school building can hold. 

Career and Technical Education (CTE):  An education pathway that provides direction and instruction in areas leading to careers, work preparation and life skills. 

Career Pathways: A series of connected education and training programs, work experiences, and student support services that enable individuals to secure a job or advance in a demand industry occupation. 

Collaboration Space/Extended Learning Area:  Extends the classroom learning beyond the traditional classroom space.  A gathering place for small and large groups for informal instruction, study groups as well as individual learning. 

Comprehensive School:  A high school which serves the needs of all its students, offering curriculum such as language arts, social studies, sciences, math, and elective offerings including music, visual & performing arts, physical education and sports. 

Educational Adequacy: An assessment to determine the buildings ability to accommodate the programming, or educational courses, being offered. It takes into consideration physical attributes of classrooms, environment as well as systems within the facility. 

Enrollment:  The number of students attending a particular school or division. 

Ethnicity:  A socially defined category of people who identify with each other based on a perceived shared social experience or ancestry.  Membership of an ethnic group tends to be associated with and ideologies of shared cultural heritage, ancestry, history, homeland, language or dialect, and with symbolic systems such as religion, mythology and ritual, cuisine, dressing style, physical appearance, etc. 

Facility Maximum Capacity:  The maximum number of students a school building can accommodate or hold. 

Facility Program/Functional Capacity:  The number of students a school building can hold based on the current program or curriculum being delivered. 

Facility Recommended Capacity:  Suggested number of students that a school building should accommodate.   

Facility Condition Index: This is a standard benchmark that is used to objectively assess the current condition of a building. It is the total cost of needed building repairs and upgrades divided by the current cost of replacing the building.

Family Census Data:  A family includes a householder and one or more people living in the same household who are related to the householder by birth, marriage, or adoption. 

General Classrooms:  Those classrooms primarily used for core curriculum and instruction such as language arts, social studies, and math that do not require specific facility considerations such as specialized electricity or water systems.   

Geographic Information Systems (GIS): GISintegrates software, hardware, data, and people to create, store, analyze, display, report, and manage geographic information 

Grade Configuration: The arrangement of students into grade groupings.  A common grade grouping would be K-5, 6-8, 9-12 grades.  Other examples include PK-3, PK-6, K-3, K-8, 4-6, 7-9, 9-12, and 10-12. 

Historical Enrollment:  The number of students attending a particular school or division in the past.  For example, if we say the historical enrollment of Julie Penrose Elementary School in 2015-2016 was 314 students, we are indicating that the number of students attending that school in that year was 314 students.

Household Census Data:  A household includes all the people who occupy a housing unit as their usual place of residence 

International Baccalaureate:  A non-profit, certified program for students aged 3 to 19 that seeks to “develop the intellectual, personal, emotional and social skills to live, learn and work in a rapidly globalizing world.” 

Load Factor:  Also known as “utilization factor”.  It is very difficult to schedule every teaching station every period of the day.  There may be a specialized space such as a lab for which there is insufficient enrollment to conduct classes each period.  At times it is not possible to maintain an average enrollment of 25 students and there needs to be some room to adjust.  It is recommended that the average load factor be 85% for the secondary level, representing an approximate utilization of a space 6 out of 7 periods during a school day.   

Magnet/Thematic Schools:  A comprehensive school that provide an interdisciplinary themed instructional delivery model (e.g. Science & Technology, the Arts, “Back to Basics”, Spanish Immersion, STEM, etc.). 

Program Requirements:  What the facility needs to effectively deliver the curriculum.   

Programs:  The curriculum that is taught / delivered.   

Projected Enrollment:  Student attendance forecast. 

Pull-Out Rooms:  Primarily used by the special education population, but also used for one to one instruction and tutoring.  

Redistricting: The process of adjusting attendance boundaries using certain criteria such as major thoroughfares as boundaries for the purpose of balancing enrollment. 

Replacement Cost: The hard cost per square foot plus the costs assumed for site improvements to replace a facility at its current square footage. 

Resource Rooms: Similar to pull-out rooms, primarily used by the special education population, but also used for one to one instruction and tutoring. 

School Attendance Boundary/Zone: The imaginary “lines” that define an area assigned to a school for enrollment purposes. 

School Within a School: A building layout that allows more than one school to function on shared land and/or in shared building space, often by using the same common areas (cafeterias, gyms, etc.). 

Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM): A program where the curriculum is centered on education in the disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. 

Socioeconomic Status:  An economic and sociological combined total measure of a person's work experience and of an individual's or family’s economic and social position in relation to others, based on income, education, and occupation. 

Specialty Class:  A program or class in a school facility designed for a certain group of students.  Also known as Electives.  (e.g., Photography, Gym, Band) 

Student Density:  A measure of student population within a given area. 

Survival Ratio:  The percentage of students that enroll in the division/grade in a school year compared to the number of students enrolled in the previous division/grade in the previous year.   

Teaching Spaces:  Also referred to as Teaching Stations, are those spaces to which students are assigned per the master schedule of a building for core curriculum and elective courses.  Examples of teaching spaces are: general classrooms, science classrooms, and at the secondary level, art, music, and gymnasiums. 

Utilization:  Enrollment divided by capacity.