Friends, it's Phil.

This campaign is about listening — and working together with the good people in Colorado to deliver solutions. That’s why it is important for me to share what I am hearing from Colorado teachers, students, parents, school board members, school administrators, and community leaders. It's a wake up call.

We are losing teachers, and our students cannot succeed without them.

At a recent roundtable, I heard from Jefferson County teachers that over 50% of them worked second jobs. All of them worried that they could never afford to buy a home. And they were all struggling to afford health care.

In fact, these teachers aren’t alone. In 2025, nearly half (47%) of Colorado teachers revealed they are considering leaving the education profession in the near future, citing heavy workloads, burnout, high stress, and low pay.

Like the one featured on Time Magazine’s cover below, teachers’ personal stories are harrowing. No teacher should need to work extra jobs, rely on food banks to make ends meet, struggle with medical debt, or find themselves unable to afford a home. I have a plan for us to do better — read on to learn more.

Case study: Adams 12 School District
Adams 12 School District, north of Denver, is a case in point on how we can lean in and do better. In early 2025 the District announced it needed to cut nearly $30 million and 150 jobs for the 2025-2026 school year due to budget pressures. Salaries for its teachers already rank 10th out of the 15 nearest districts.

To address these challenges, in 2024, Adams 12 leaders had pushed a new county funding ballot measure. That one failed; yet they kept at it. This Fall, a similar measure passed, thanks to a grassroots educator-led effort including teachers knocking on doors, improving teacher pay, offering mental health support to students, and supporting critical staff like bus drivers and cafeteria workers.

The question before us: will we make these critical investments across our state?

The Trump Administration’s attack on public education
The Trump administration is making matters worse, undermining public education by threatening to withhold critical funds, cutting teacher training, and slashing youth mental health funding.

We are fighting back. I have gone to court to protect Colorado in each of these cases.

The latest challenge is pressuring Colorado to accept a school voucher-type program. I welcome more federal support for education and investing in our students’ future. But I will never support privatizing our public K-12 schools — or siphoning off scarce public education dollars to private and religious institutions.

Instead, my Colorado Blueprint calls on us to invest in K-12 education by:

🍎 Paying our teachers a living wage
🍎 Providing down payment support to teachers, so they can afford homes in the communities where they work
🍎 Working with Colorado teachers to create better options for health insurance
🍎 Leading an effort at the ballot box so we can invest in K-12 schools, teachers, and our kids’ futures

How do you think we can improve our community’s public education system? Let us know here.

As Governor, I will make improving Colorado’s system of public education — including supporting our teachers and our students’ futures — a top priority. I am ready to and committed to taking on this important challenge. To help me do so, please share your ideas. I will read them all and follow up with more details on how we can do better.

With you for our teachers, students, parents, and communities,

Phil