Colorado Springs School District 11 has paid Panorama Education over $200,000 for services and surveys; surveys ask students about issues regarding race and ethnicity

Parents Defending Education submitted a public records request to Colorado Springs School District 11 seeking contracts and invoices that the district has with Panorama Education, as well as any Panorama surveys provided by the school district and documents in the district’s possession with Panorama data. The school district provided PDE with 234 pages of documents. The school district appears to have most recently paid Panorama Education on July 6, 2023, for services that include “Student Climate Surveys & SEL: Platform Licenses,” “Annual Licenses: Check-Ins,” and “Professional Development.” The total cost was $64,573.

One of the documents PDE received was a contract with Panorama Education dated December 2015. On January 25, 2016, the school district paid Panorama Education $8,700 to “Provide Employee Climate Survey.” The district also paid Panorama $8,700 for the same services in 2017 and 2018. Another purchase order also shows that the district paid Panorama $11,000 in 2018. On July 15, 2019, the school district paid Panorama $21,300 for a “Social-Emotional Learning Platform.” On July 8, 2020, the district paid Panorama $37,075 for the same platform. On August 20, 2021, the school district paid Panorama $31,680.50 for an “Emotional Learning Platform” and licenses. In 2022, the school district paid Panorama $48,022.25 to provide the platform. Multiple smaller invoices are also included in the documents.

The Panorama surveys that the district provided to PDE also include questions for students about race and identity. The following questions are asked in surveys for students:

• How often do teachers encourage you to learn about people from different races, ethnicities, or cultures?
• How often do you think about what someone of a different race, ethnicity, or culture experiences?
• How confident are you that students at your school can have honest conversations with each other about race?
• At your school, how often are you encouraged to think more deeply about race-related topics?
• When there are major news events related to race, how often do adults at your school talk about them with students?
• How well does your school help students speak out against racism?

Panorama Education Inc. is an organization known for helping schools throughout the country survey the race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender identity of students in an effort to push “equity and inclusion” in school systems. The organization offers an “Equity and Inclusion Survey” to “help schools and districts track the progress of equity initiatives through the lens of students and staff, identify areas for celebration and improvement, inform professional development, and signal the importance of equity and inclusion to the community.”