1. Build Strong Foundations

The Challenge: Too many students fall behind before high school, limiting their future options.

The Vision: Every Colorado child enters kindergarten ready to learn, achieves grade-level proficiency in reading and math, and has access to high-quality educational options that meet their needs.

The Priorities:

• Expand access to high-quality early learning through a state-supported mixed delivery model, especially for children furthest from opportunity.
• Ensure that early literacy instruction aligns with the science of reading and math standards emphasize problem-solving and conceptual understanding.
• Provide transparent, easier-to-access data on school performance and student progress.
• Empower families with real choices through diverse, high-quality school options and accessible transportation.
• Begin career awareness in middle school so students see how education connects to future opportunities.

2. Expand Pathways to Prosperity

The Challenge: Only 27% of Colorado high school graduates earn a postsecondary credential within six years, even though 90% of living-wage jobs require one.

The Vision: High school becomes a launchpad, where every student gains purpose, experience, and a credential of value before graduation.

The Priorities:

• Guarantee access to the “Big Three” experiences: college credit, industry credential, or work-based learning for every student by graduation.
• Simplify and scale concurrent enrollment and dual-credit pathways, especially for students traditionally underrepresented in higher education.
• Create community infrastructure that connects districts, higher education, and employers around shared pathways in high-demand fields.
• Use accountability systems that measure outcomes that matter: credential attainment, employment, and wage progression..

3. Modernize Postsecondary for a Talent-Driven Economy

The Challenge: Half of middle-skill jobs require training beyond high school but not a bachelor’s degree, yet only 15% of working-age Coloradans hold such credentials.

The Vision: A talent-development system that is flexible, responsive, and focused on outcomes, where learners can upskill throughout life and employers find qualified workers when and where they’re needed.

The Priorities:

• Fund postsecondary and workforce programs based on outcomes: completion, employment, and wage gains.
• Expand high-quality short-term credential programs and support federal Workforce Pell implementation.
• Invest in stackable credentials that let learners progress from certificates to degrees while working.
• Expand apprenticeships and earn-and-learn models that reduce the opportunity cost of education.
• Align financial aid and wraparound supports (childcare, transportation, coaching) to make training accessible and completion attainable.

4. Connect Data for Smarter Decisions

The Challenge: Colorado is data-rich but information-poor; disconnected systems limit accountability and improvement.

The Vision: A secure, statewide longitudinal data system that connects early childhood, K–12, higher education, training, and workforce outcomes, empowering families, educators, employers, and policymakers with transparent, actionable insight.

The Priorities:

• Build a single, sustainable statewide longitudinal data system linking education and workforce outcomes.
• Publish clear dashboards showing supply and demand, program effectiveness, credential attainment, employment outcomes, and return on investment at 1-, 5-, and 10-year intervals.
• Require all publicly funded training programs to report consistent outcome metrics.
• Use data to identify equity gaps and direct public investment to programs that deliver results for populations furthest from opportunity.

5. Empower Business as Co-Creators of Solutions

The Challenge: Employers need skilled talent; educators need real-world input. Yet engagement remains fragmented and transactional.

The Vision: Colorado becomes the national model for employer-driven talent systems, where business leaders co-design pathways, shape credentials, and co-invest in workforce solutions that deliver measurable economic impact.

The Priorities:

• Establish a business-led coordinating body with real decision-making authority on workforce strategy and investment.
• Align federal and state plans (WIOA, Perkins, etc.) under shared goals and sector-based priorities.
• Provide incentives and streamlined processes for businesses to offer apprenticeships, internships, and other work-based learning opportunities.
• Invest in intermediaries such as nonprofits, chambers, and talent associations that help small and mid-sized employers participate in talent development.
• Focus resources on Colorado’s six high-growth sectors: Healthcare, Professional & Technical Services, Aerospace, Energy, Construction, and Transportation.

What Success Looks Like

Since Colorado Succeeds’ founding, we’ve advanced bipartisan solutions that make Colorado’s systems more agile, equitable, and effective. Working with governors, legislators, and educators, we have:

• Expanded access to high-quality early learning.
• Modernized K–12 funding and accountability systems.
• Strengthened college and career pathways through concurrent enrollment, industry credentials, and work-based learning.
• Aligned postsecondary and workforce programs with Colorado’s economic priorities.

Our impact comes through partnership and leadership: uniting business, education, and government leaders around shared goals and evidence-based solutions that deliver measurable results for learners and employers alike.

Our vision of success:

Learners:

• Every child enters kindergarten ready to learn.
• 80% of students achieve grade-level proficiency in reading and math by eighth grade.
• Every graduate earns at least one meaningful credential and completes real-world work experience.
• 50% of graduates complete a postsecondary credential of value within six years, regardless of zip code or background.

Employers:

• Talent shortages decline as reliable, homegrown pipelines of skilled workers emerge.
• Businesses easily engage in education and training partnerships.
• Sector collaboratives use real-time data to close skills gaps and grow regional economies.

System:

• Families access transparent data to make informed choices.
• Public funding flows to programs that deliver measurable results.
• Data-driven accountability accelerates improvement and equity.
• Education and workforce systems respond nimbly to evolving economic demands.