SOUTHEAST SPRINGS, Colo. (KOAA) — As students return to classrooms across Harrison School District 2, some of the people welcoming them back have a personal connection to the halls they now work in.
More than 100 staff members working in D2 schools are also graduates of the district, according to D2.
For Assistant Superintendent of Support Services Angela Valdez, that connection stretches back nearly three decades.
Valdez graduated from Sierra High School in 1997. She later returned to D2, working her way from teacher to assistant principal, principal, and now district leadership.
“I am a 1997 graduate of Sierra High School, proud to be a Stallion,” Valdez said.
After teaching in Denver Public Schools, Valdez said she knew where she wanted to return when she moved back to Colorado Springs.
“There’s no other district I’d want to teach for besides District 2,” she said.
Valdez said the educators who supported her as a student influenced her decision to return and serve the same community.
She remembers one of those teachers in particular: her former Sierra High School Spanish teacher, Mr. Padilla.
Years after Valdez graduated, Padilla reached out to tell her he had been following her career and was proud of her.
“To hear those words 30 years later... brought me to tears,” Valdez said.
She said Padilla's influence helped inspire her to become an educator herself.
“...He really impacted me to go into education and be that Mr. Padilla for somebody else,” she said.
Valdez is not the only D2 alumna who returned to work in the district.
Dawn-Antoinette Thomas graduated from Sierra High School in 1998. After beginning her teaching career at the middle-school level, she returned to her former high school in 2005 to teach English.
“I wanted to teach high school, but for that opening to be at my former high school, that’s unique,” Thomas said. “What other place to do it besides Sierra? That’s home.”
Thomas now works as an instructional coach, helping support and train teachers across the district.
She said the number of new teachers she is training has changed in recent years.
“This year I can count on one maybe two hands how many new English teachers that I trained,” Thomas said.
D2 currently has three licensed positions open, according to Valdez.
She said the district's focus on relationships and culture has helped with both recruitment and retention.
“I think the biggest thing that I’ve seen change from the time that I was a student, teacher, administrator to now is the shift in culture and relationships,” Valdez said.
Thomas said retaining teachers also creates consistency for students and families.
“When you build community, you also build confidence,” she said.
That stability comes as D2 celebrates its Class of 2025 graduation results.
The district's graduation rate reached 89.8%, a 6.7 percentage-point increase from the previous year and above the statewide rate of 85.6%.
D2 says it is the district's highest graduation rate in more than a decade.
Harrison High School reached a 92.2% graduation rate, while Sierra High School reached 85.2%. Career Readiness Academy saw the largest increase, reaching 69.2%, according to district data.
District officials point to the work of students, families and educators behind those numbers.
But the district also says there is still work to do.
Thomas said one focus for the new school year is improving student writing scores through a more coordinated approach across subjects.
For Valdez and Thomas, the work is also personal.
They were once students walking the halls of D2.
Now, they're helping welcome the next generation through those same doors.
