Denver Public Schools · Est. 1960 · The Spartans
Home of the
Spartans.
Thomas Jefferson High School, TJ, is a brown-and-gold community in southeast Denver where a big-school roster feels like a close family.
- 1960
- Year founded
- 1,375
- Students · Grades 9–12
- 18:1
- Student–teacher ratio
- Brown & Gold
- School colors
Identity
A big school that runs like a family.
Brown & gold, since day one
Thomas Jefferson opened its doors in 1960 and took its colors, brown and gold, from the original Denver Broncos uniforms of that same year. Six decades on, the palette still reads across the building, the field, and the crowd.
Students and staff call the school TJ, and they describe the culture the same way year after year: a large, diverse student body that somehow stays close-knit. The mascot is the Spartan; the ethos is belonging.
Mascot since 1960 · brown & gold · Spartan Athletics →
“TJ is a big family, everyone finds their people here.”
Academics
The newsroom that made TJ famous.
Center for Communication Technology Magnet
Launched in 1994, the CCTM is TJ's signature: a four-year magnet program with industry-standard training in robotics, software engineering, web applications, 3D design, and broadcast journalism, taught across seven computer labs, robotics workshops, and digital studios.
Students can earn up to 21 college credits at no cost before they graduate. Around the magnet sits a college- and career-readiness core with a broad AP catalog open to any student ready to push.
CCT magnet founded
College credits available through CCTM, free
AP participation rate
Community
Drawn from all of Denver.
Diversity is the default
TJ pulls students from neighborhoods across the city, and the result is a genuinely mixed hallway. Two of every three students identify as students of color, and the school serves a large share of families who qualify as economically disadvantaged.
Staff treat that mix as the point, not a footnote. The range of backgrounds is what makes the “big family” feel real.
Students of color
Economically disadvantaged
Total enrollment · 2023–24
Athletics
Spartan sport, dawn to Friday night.
Fifteen-plus programs
The Spartans field a full slate across the seasons, enough that most students who want to compete can find a team. Brown and gold show up on the turf, the mat, the court, and the track.
In focus: boys basketball
One of those fifteen is written up in full in the section that follows, because it is the one this site was asked about: what it actually takes for an incoming ninth grader to make the team. The short version is that the program has room for him and the calendar is unforgiving — a single tryout, once a year, in November.
- Three teams
- Varsity, junior varsity and a C-team, so a freshman does not have to make varsity to play. Most ninth graders who make the program land on the C-team
- Head coach
- Grant Laman, a TJ alum and, in the school's own words, head coach "for the past 14 seasons" — two state championships and the Great 8 in six of them
- Mon Nov 16, 2026
- The first day CHSAA allows any Colorado school to practise basketball, and the week TJ holds its tryout. There is no second one in January
- Recent form
- Five straight winning seasons and a state tournament berth in most of them, including 19-6 and a league title in 2024-25
- The rest of it
- Spartan Basketball — the roster ladder, the coaching staff, the winter calendar, CHSAA's out-of-season rules, and where to train in the south metro between now and November
Basketball
Three teams, and one week in November.
The sport above gets a section to itself, because it is the one this page was built to answer — and it runs on a clock of its own. Fall sport starts before school does; basketball does not start until the school year is three months old. CHSAA sets the date statewide, and for 2026-27 it is Monday, November 16 — the first day any Colorado high school may hold a basketball practice, which is also the week TJ holds its tryout.
That single week decides the season, and it happens once. There is no second round in January for a player who was not ready in November. Everything between an August arrival and that Monday is preparation — which is the good news, because it is fourteen weeks of it, and none of it requires permission from anybody.
The far end of that season is the Denver Coliseum, where the large classes play out the Great 8, the Final Four and the state championships — March 11 in 2027. Everything below is about getting on a bus that goes there.
Boys teams — varsity, junior varsity and a C-team, so a freshman does not have to make varsity to play
State championships won at TJ by the current head coach, back to back in 2005 and 2006
Straight winning seasons, 2021-22 through 2025-26, with a state tournament berth in most of them
The fall workouts, and they are already on the calendar
This is the part that is usually invisible from outside a building, and TJ publishes it. The program runs open workouts through September and October, twice a week, at TJ, and the flyer names the audience precisely: any TJ student planning to try out for the boys team in November. No selection, no cut, nothing to qualify for — and it is the single clearest answer to "how does a new kid get on the coaches' radar before the tryout".
The flyer is reproduced here as the program published it. Every date, time and condition below is read straight off it, so if the two ever disagree, believe the flyer.
- Saturdays
- 10 a.m. – 12 p.m., from Saturday, September 12
- Tuesdays
- 6:30 – 7:45 a.m., before school, from Tuesday, September 15
- Where
- All workouts are at TJ
- Who it is for
- Any TJ student planning to try out in November. The flyer's own closing line is "please come join us"
- Changes
- Announced in the Spartan Edition, the school newsletter — watch it rather than assuming the schedule holds all autumn
- Questions
- Coach Laman, glaman@dpsk12.net — the address he puts on the flyer himself
The flyer answers this directly, and the two conditions are not negotiable: a fall-sport athlete is welcome at the workouts, but he can never miss a fall sport team function for one, and his fall sport coach has to be fine with it. So the order is: commit to the fall sport, tell that coach about the basketball workouts, then go to whatever does not collide.
In practice the Tuesday session is the easy one — 6:30 a.m. is before school, and fall practice is after it, so they rarely touch. Saturday mornings are where meets and matches will take the decision out of his hands, and the flyer is clear about which way it goes.
Which team he is actually trying out for
TJ carries three levels, and MaxPreps keeps a separate schedule for each one every winter. That matters more than it sounds: at a school fielding only varsity and JV, a ninth grader is competing against seventeen-year-olds for the last seat. Here there is a level built for him.
Varsity
Roughly twelve to fifteen players, mostly juniors and seniors. Freshmen reach it, but rarely, and only as standouts. The 2025-26 varsity returned two of its leading juniors, so there is an experienced core in front of this year's ninth graders rather than a gap to walk into.
Not the freshman target, and that is fine
Junior varsity
Mostly sophomores, with the stronger freshmen pulled up and some juniors held here. This is the stretch goal for a ninth grader who arrives in November already fit and already skilled — which is to say, it is decided by what happens between now and then.
Take it if it is offered
C-team
The development level, and where most freshmen who make the program land. Minutes are broad here and thin further up, so a season of real playing time on the C-team is worth more to a fourteen-year-old than a bench seat on JV.
Aim here, and earn up from it
None of which makes it automatic. Three levels lower the odds of being cut for a committed, in-shape freshman; they do not remove them, because the seats are still finite and the tryout is still competitive. What it does mean is that the honest goal is make the program, not make varsity.
Eligibility is not a question here. A first-time ninth grader is eligible for everything under CHSAA Article 18, with no transfer penalty and no waiver, and the three steps to clearance — FamilyID, the $92 season fee, and the official CHSAA physical — are set out in the Playbook, with the calendar and the people to email in the Action Plan. Winter registration opens in the fall; the physical is valid 365 days, so one taken in California in July still covers a November tryout.
The staff, and how long they have been there
TJ's own basketball page puts it plainly: "Coach Laman is a TJ Alum who has been the Head Basketball Coach for the past 14 seasons. He has won two State Championships at TJ and made it to the Great 8 in six seasons." He coached JV for four years before that, and he also teaches in the building.
The staff has been stable, which is the part that matters for a ninth grader: the C-team and JV coaches who evaluate him in November are likely to still be there when he is a junior, so the impression made this winter is an investment rather than a one-off audition.
One overlap worth noticing: the JV coach is the same Kyler Jackson who runs the Ninth Grade Academy. The family will already have emailed him in August about the Academy roster, which makes him the one coach in the program who is not a cold contact. TJ's basketball page lists him at kyler_jackson@dpsk12.org and the Academy page at kjackso@dpsk12.net; both are published, so reply on whichever thread already exists.
The winter clock, 2026-27
These are CHSAA's published dates for the coming season, not projections from last year. TJ plays Class 5A on the shared 5A/6A playoff calendar, in the Denver Public Schools all-city league.
- Mon Nov 16
- First practice — the earliest date any Colorado school may practise basketball, and the week TJ holds its tryout
- Sat Nov 21
- First scrimmage permitted
- Mon Nov 30
- First contest — the season opens the Monday after Thanksgiving
- Dec 24–27
- Winter practice and competition prohibition. Voluntary practice resumes Dec 28; no games
- Dec – Feb
- Regular season, roughly twenty-plus games, plus the DPS league schedule and league tournament
- Sat Feb 20
- End of the 5A/6A regular season
- Sun Feb 21
- 5A/6A seeding meeting, 4 p.m. — the bracket is set here
- Wed Feb 24
- Boys 5A/6A first round
- Sat Feb 27
- Boys 5A/6A second round
- Fri Mar 5
- 5A Great 8
- Thu Mar 11
- State championships, boys and girls, at the Denver Coliseum, 4600 Humboldt St
November 16 is when CHSAA allows practice to begin. TJ's own tryout date, time and location come from the athletics office, and they are published on the athletics page as "Season Start Dates and Coach Contact Info" — ask for them in October, not November. A tryout missed by a day is a season missed by four months.
What a coach can and cannot do before November
The gap between August and the tryout is governed by CHSAA's out-of-season rules, and they are more permissive than most families assume — but in a specific direction. A coach cannot audition anyone early. He can absolutely be in the same gym.
- Open gyms
- Permitted, and the single best way to be seen. They must be student-driven and recreational, open to all students, with the coach supervising rather than instructing
- TJ's fall workouts
- The Tuesday and Saturday sessions above are the conditioning kind, which is why they can be coached and scheduled — set out at the top of this section
- Conditioning
- Weights and conditioning are allowed year-round, coached, with no seasonal limit
- Summer
- The loosest window: school coaches may work with their own players in team camps, summer league and open gyms — the reason next summer matters for sophomore year
- Moratorium
- A dead period in late June and early July when no contact between school coaches and athletes is permitted at all
- Winter break
- Dec 24–27 this season: no competition, and practice only becomes voluntary again on Dec 28
- What is not allowed
- A mandatory tryout, cut or team selection before the first practice date. Nobody makes the team in September, which also means nobody misses it in September
Five seasons of Spartan basketball
A consistent winning program and a regular playoff qualifier, without being a state title contender in this window. For an incoming player that is close to the ideal shape: a real postseason most years, and minutes that are reachable over a four-year arc rather than blocked by a stacked roster.
- 2021-22
- 15-9 overall, 7-2 in league
- 2022-23
- 15-10 overall, 7-0 in league — league champions
- 2023-24
- 14-11 overall, 5-2 in league
- 2024-25
- 19-6 overall, 7-1 in league, first place. Entered the 5A state tournament as the 15 seed and lost in the second round at 2-seed Mesa Ridge, 68-47. The strongest recent season
- 2025-26
- 13-11 overall, 6-2 in league, second place. Beat Montbello 55-51 in the DPS league tournament and hosted a 5A first-round game, losing to Coronado 58-73
The main event: what to do with fourteen weeks
This is the part that is entirely inside the family's control, and it is the highest-leverage thing on this page. C-team and JV coaches select for a short list at a November tryout, and it is not the same list a highlight reel would suggest. In rough order of what separates a freshman from the freshman next to him:
- Ball-handling, both hands. Daily two-ball work, change of direction, handling under light pressure. For a guard-sized ninth grader this is the fastest visible separation there is.
- Shooting form, then range. Groove a repeatable stroke close to the rim before extending it. Hundreds of makes, not hundreds of heaves — and free throws every single session.
- Finishing. Layups off both feet with both hands, plus a floater. Most freshmen can only finish one way, and a defender learns which way in about two possessions.
- Defense and conditioning. Stance, sliding, closeouts, and the legs to do it in the fourth quarter at altitude. Coaches keep the freshman who defends and runs the floor even while his shot is still arriving.
- Basketball IQ. Play real games — rec, open gym, pickup — so the skills survive contact with live decisions. Drill work that has never been tested under a defender does not transfer to a tryout.
A workable week, offseason: four or five days of basketball, mixing solo skill work of 45 to 60 minutes with two or three sessions of live play; two or three days of age-appropriate strength and conditioning; and one or two full rest days, which are training rather than the absence of it.
Where to actually do it, in the south metro
Denver's south metro is dense with clubs, trainers, rec leagues and college camps, most of them a short drive from Southmoor Park and the Tech Center. Prices and dates below are from the 2026 cycle and are indicative — confirm each with the program. For a brand-new freshman, a local development-focused team beats an elite travel program every time.
Clubs & AAU
Tryouts cluster March–April for the spring and summer season. Costs run from the high hundreds into the low thousands with travel
- Colorado Chaos Tryouts Mar–AprLakewood-based, 25 years old, and by its own count 543 college players including 135 Division I and six NBA
- Colorado Hoops Academy Fall tryoutsFormerly 5280 Hoops, Douglas County. Development-first — "more training and development over just piling on games"
- Pro Skills Basketball · Denver Structured evalsThe Denver chapter of a national club, with a formal tryout and evaluation process
- MONDO Athletics August tryoutsDenver and Westminster. Tryouts run late Feb–early Mar for the summer season and in August for fall and winter — the one club window an August arrival can still walk into this year
- Premier Basketball Club 2,000+ players/yrTeams plus low-cost camps in Littleton, Lakewood, Highlands Ranch and Parker
Trainers & courts
Skill volume between team commitments. Private lessons in the metro start around $30–$50 an hour and climb
- Club Greenwood Greenwood VillageNBA-regulation indoor court, drop-in games, youth programs and lessons
- The Basketball Social House Centennial7450 S University Blvd. Year-round development, clinics, leagues and private training in a 21,000 sq ft facility
- MONDO private training Metro-widePrivate and small-group sessions across Denver, Aurora, Centennial, Highlands Ranch, Lone Tree, Parker, Greenwood Village and Littleton
- Athletes Untapped From ~$30/hrA marketplace for booking vetted private coaches by the hour, useful for filling gaps rather than committing to a program
Rec & low-cost
Game reps, which is the thing solo drill work cannot supply. No tryout, no cut
- Denver Parks & Recreation youth basketball Winter seasonLow-cost city leagues. The MY Denver Card gives DPS students free or reduced rec-centre access across Denver, and with it year-round court time
- YMCA of Metro Denver Ages up to 14Six-to-eight week seasons; the indoor season runs mid-October to mid-December. Note the age cap — this is a this-year option only
- JCC Denver Youth leaguesAnother low-cost indoor option in the south-central metro
- i9 Sports Everyone playsNo tryouts and guaranteed playing time — worth it purely for live reps while the skill work happens elsewhere
Camps
Concentrated instruction, mostly in June, with registration opening the winter or spring before. The good ones sell out
- CU Boulder boys basketball camp ~$540 · JuneAges 8–17, 9 a.m.–4 p.m., plus a separate elite camp for grades 9–12. CU warns it sells out every year — bill.cartun@colorado.edu, 303-492-2992
- MSU Denver Roadrunners camps ~$455 · JuneThe Complete Skills Camp with the men's head coach, plus a one-day shooting camp at around $130
- University of Denver Pioneers Closest to homeYouth programming a few miles from Southmoor Park; check the athletics site for dates
- PGC Basketball Multi-dayDecision-training camps for serious players, run in Colorado each summer
- Breakthrough Basketball Skills campsMulti-day skills and shooting camps at Colorado locations
Fourteen, and still growing
Age-appropriate strength training is safe and useful for a teenager when it is supervised and form-first: bodyweight and light-load movement quality before load — squats, hinges, push-ups, planks, single-leg balance, jump rope — and light resistance work introduced with a qualified coach.
The real risk at this age is not weights, it is volume. A growing fourteen-year-old should not play one sport twelve months a year at intensity. Vary the activity, deload through a growth spurt, and treat persistent knee, heel or lower-back pain as information rather than something to push through — the classic growth-plate flags are Osgood-Schlatter at the knee and Sever's at the heel.
And the altitude, which The Move already covers: arriving from sea level costs a week or two of conditioning. Hydrate hard, build gradually, and do not read the first fortnight of gasping as a fitness verdict.
Email Coach Laman before school starts, and say he will be at the September workouts. Short and specific: an incoming freshman, new to Denver, planning to try out in November, coming to the Tuesday and Saturday sessions — and asking what he should be working on between now and then. Copy the C-team coach, who is the one who will actually be evaluating him, and the Athletic Director, who does the clearing.
Note the ask has changed shape now that the flyer exists: it is no longer "are there open gyms", it is "I will be there on the 12th." That is a better email, and it costs nothing. Send it to glaman@dpsk12.net, cc kenneth_leverock@dpsk12.org and anne_rice@dpsk12.net.
Introduce yourself, and start the daily work
- Send the email above, and put Saturday September 12 and Tuesday September 15 in the calendar now — the fall workouts start before anyone thinks to remind him.
- Start the skill routine now rather than in October — ball-handling and shooting daily, conditioning three times a week. Fourteen weeks of it is a different player; four weeks of it is not.
- Check whether a club still has a fall or winter tryout open. MONDO runs August tryouts for its fall and winter teams, which is the rare club window that lines up with an August arrival.
- Confirm the CHSAA physical is on file and dated — it lasts 365 days, so a summer physical covers the whole winter season.
Be a known name before the tryout, not a new one
- Go to the fall workouts. Tuesdays 6:30–7:45 a.m. from September 15, Saturdays 10 a.m.–12 p.m. from September 12, at TJ, straight through September and October. Every one he can make. This is the whole point of the September-to-November window, and it is the only part of it the coaches actually watch.
- Play a fall sport too. Cross country or soccer build exactly the aerobic base basketball rewards, the season ends before basketball practice opens, and it puts him inside the athletic department months early. It stacks with the workouts as long as the fall coach approves and no team function is ever missed for one.
- Watch the Spartan Edition for workout changes, and expect a deep fall playoff run to eat some Saturdays.
- Keep skill volume up on the side — a rec league, a private coach, or an hour at a facility a couple of times a week.
- In October, confirm the exact tryout date, time and location with the athletics office, and register and pay for the winter season as soon as the window opens.
Compete on the two things he fully controls
- Arrive in shape. Conditioning is the most visible variable in a gym full of strangers and the one nobody can fake for three days.
- Compete on defense and effort. Shots come and go at fourteen; a freshman who guards, talks, and sprints the floor gets kept.
- Be coachable, on time, and low-maintenance. Coaches are choosing a group they will spend four months with.
- Target the C-team, take JV if it is offered, and ask Coach Laman directly where he projects if the answer is not obvious.
The offseason that actually moves the needle
- Club tryouts run March and April. Pick a local, development-focused, low-travel team over an elite travel program for a first season.
- Do a college skills camp in June — CU, MSU Denver or DU. Register in winter or early spring; the good ones fill.
- Summer is the one window where school coaches may work directly with their own players, in team camps and summer league. That is where a C-team freshman becomes a JV sophomore.
Benchmarks that should change the plan
Three signals worth watching for, each of which redirects the effort rather than just adding to it.
- Ahead of the room
- If he is clearly among the better players at the fall workouts, aim at JV rather than the C-team, and ask Coach Laman directly where he projects. That conversation is free and it is the only reliable read
- Behind on fitness
- Prioritise the daily solo work and an hourly private coach over an expensive travel programme. A club season does not fix conditioning; it just costs more while the problem persists
- Something hurts
- Persistent knee, heel or lower-back pain during a growth spurt means cut the volume and see a doctor before pushing through. Nothing about a freshman season is worth a year of it
What is published, and what is projected. The 2026-27 dates — first practice Nov 16, first scrimmage Nov 21, first contest Nov 30, the Dec 24–27 prohibition, the Feb 20 end of the 5A/6A regular season, the Feb 24 and Feb 27 boys rounds, the Mar 5 5A Great 8 and the Mar 11 state championships — come from CHSAA's own 2026-27 calendar and are firm. TJ's tryout date is not one of them: it is set by the school within that window and has to be confirmed with the athletics office. Season records are from MaxPreps, and the head coach's record and the two state titles are TJ's own wording on its boys basketball page.
The fall workout times, dates and conditions come from the program's own TJ Boys B-Ball Fall Workouts flyer for fall 2026 — the Tuesday and Saturday sessions, the September 12 and September 15 start dates, the Spartan Edition notice, the "please come join us", and both fall-sport conditions are the flyer's, not an inference — and the flyer itself is reproduced above so it can be read directly rather than taken on trust. It is TJ's own document, shown here unaltered apart from a white margin added to fit the frame. It also tells students to expect changes, so treat the schedule as correct at the start of the season rather than guaranteed through October.
Coach emails and extensions come from that same TJ page and can change season to season. Note that DPS publishes staff on two domains — the coaching staff appears at @dpsk12.org while the school directory used elsewhere on this page uses @dpsk12.net, and Coach Laman's flyer gives a third form, glaman@dpsk12.net, which is the one to use because it is the one he hands out. If any of them bounces, try another. The $92 season fee, the CHSAA physical requirement and the out-of-season contact rules are summarised here and set out properly in the Playbook; CHSAA sub-bylaw numbering moves between editions, so verify anything being filed officially through the Athletic Director.
Club, trainer, rec and camp prices and dates are 2026-cycle figures gathered from each programme's own site and are offered as a starting point for calls, not as quotes. This is an unofficial community resource and is not affiliated with TJ, DPS, CHSAA or any programme listed. For official information use tjhs.dpsk12.org and chsaanow.com.
The Neighborhood
Southeast Denver, best explored on two wheels.
Bible Park & the High Line Canal
TJ sits in the Southmoor Park neighborhood, quiet, tree-lined streets tucked between Hampden Avenue and I-25. Pedal a few minutes north and you're in James A. Bible Park: open fields, cottonwoods, and the High Line Canal Trail running straight through it, 71 miles of car-free riding across the metro.
Riding electric? Class 1 and 2 e-bikes are welcome on Denver's park trails (class 3 too, since 2020). Keep it under the 15 mph trail limit and call your passes. Rosamond and Southmoor parks are minutes away, the light rail at Southmoor Station takes bikes, and Cherry Creek State Park's reservoir loops make a perfect weekend mission.
Miles of High Line Canal Trail
mph, trail speed limit for e-bikes
Minutes by e-bike to Cherry Creek State Park (approx.)
Two Neighborhoods
Virginia Village to Southmoor Park.
One street links them
The house and the school sit almost exactly north and south of each other, about 3.3 miles apart on nearly the same line of longitude. That line is South Holly Street. Leave the front door, turn south, and you are pointed at the building, with the canal greenbelt shadowing the road most of the way.
They are two versions of the same idea, both laid out as Denver spread southeast after the war: curving residential streets, low brick houses, mature trees planted by people who would not live to see them get big, and a park never more than a few blocks off.
Virginia Village
About five miles southeast of downtown, held between Colorado Boulevard, Mississippi Avenue, Quebec Street and Evans, with Cherry Creek running along the northeast edge. It is postwar Denver at its most characteristic: ranch houses and townhomes on quiet curving streets, with shopping plazas and taller apartment and office blocks gathered along the big roads.
Holly Street splits the neighborhood in two, the Ellis community to the west and Cook Park to the east. Garland Park and Cook Park do the heavy lifting for green space, and Goldsmith Gulch threads between them.
- Address
- 5495 Nebraska Way, Denver, CO 80246
- Character
- Postwar ranches, townhomes, plazas on the arterials
- Green space
- Garland Park, Cook Park, Goldsmith Gulch
- Transit
- Colorado Station light rail
- To school
- 3.9 miles, about 24 minutes by e-bike, 1.7 of it on the canal trail
Southmoor Park
The far southeast corner of the city, tucked into the pocket between Hampden Avenue and I-25. Quieter and leafier than the map suggests, because the through traffic stays on the arterials and the residential streets bend back on themselves rather than carrying anyone anywhere.
The High Line Canal is the organising feature. It runs northwest through James A. Bible Park a few minutes up Holly, and it is the reason a student here can cross this part of Denver without ever taking a lane from a car.
- Address
- 3950 S Holly St, Denver, CO 80237
- Character
- Low brick homes, bending streets, heavy tree cover
- Green space
- Southmoor Park, Bible Park, the High Line Canal
- Transit
- Southmoor Station light rail, bikes welcome
- To Grandma's
- 4.1 miles, about 18 minutes by e-bike, almost all of it on streets
The Move
Eight days from the driveway to the first bell.
You pull out of La Honda on August 15 and give the drive two days, so Denver is roughly August 17. Denver Public Schools starts Tuesday, August 25. Enrollment at TJ is already settled, which leaves about eight days on the ground, and they are not about paperwork races. They are about the handful of things that quietly decide whether the first week is a good one.
One of those things is a direct consequence of not knowing when the containers land. Anything the school needs must travel in the car, not in the shipping container. Immunization records, the final transcript, the birth certificate and the signed sports physical are all small enough to ride in a folder on the back seat, and all catastrophic to be sealed in a box somewhere on I‑70 on the morning of the twenty-fifth.
Fall sports did not wait for the move. Under the CHSAA calendar, football and boys golf began practice on August 3 and field hockey on August 10. If he wants a fall season, the call to the TJ athletics office should happen before the truck is loaded, not after.
The good news is that eligibility is clean. A student entering high school for the first time is eligible for all interscholastic competition, so none of the transfer sit-out rules apply to a ninth grader. The one hard gate is the physical: CHSAA requires a completed physical evaluation, dated within the last 365 days, before any practice, tryout or conditioning session. That is far easier to get done in California this week than in Denver during the first week of school.
Days on the ground before the first bell
Days a CHSAA sports physical stays valid
School meals, and RTD for riders 19 and under
Bring these from California
Two of these are worth more than the rest. Immunization records are the usual reason a transfer student gets sent home on day one, and Colorado's requirements are not California's. From the 2026-27 year Colorado requires a Tdap dose given on or after the tenth birthday, on top of hepatitis B, DTaP, polio, MMR and varicella. MenACWY is recommended here but not required. Get the record printed before you leave; chasing a California clinic from Denver in late August is a bad week.
The second is the sports physical above. Everything else on this list is recoverable if it slips.
- Immunization record
- Printed, complete, including a Tdap dose on or after his tenth birthday
- Sports physical
- On the CHSAA form, dated within 365 days, done in California before you drive
- Middle school records
- Final transcript or report card, plus any IEP or 504 plan
- Proof of address
- Deed, lease or a utility bill for 5495 Nebraska Way, carried in the car
- Birth certificate
- Or passport, for the registrar's file
- Meals
- Nothing to buy. Colorado's Healthy School Meals for All makes breakfast and lunch free for every public school student
- Getting around
- Nothing to buy. RTD is free for riders 19 and under, so a bike plus light rail covers most of the city
Two things California does not prepare you for
The altitude. Denver is a mile up, and a fourteen-year-old arriving from sea level and walking into an August two-a-day will feel it for a week or two. It is not fitness, it is oxygen. More water than seems reasonable, and no heroics in the first few sessions.
Ninth grade is a clean slate. High school GPA starts here, which means nothing from a California middle school follows him into the transcript. Course placement is the one exception worth checking with the registrar, because Colorado and California sequence math differently and it is much easier to adjust a schedule in the first week than in October.
Late Enrollment
Classes, sports and electives, from a standing start.
TJ picks its courses in the spring. Counselors run selection with the students already in the building and ride out to the feeder middle schools to catch the incoming ninth graders, so by May most of the next year exists on paper. A student arriving in August missed all of it.
That is a different process, not a closed door. TJ sent the freshman course list and its virtual selection form, and it has been submitted — the requests are in. What is left is a schedule assembled around them by the counselor assigned to his last name, out of whatever sections still have room. There is no lottery and no waitlist queue to have joined in March. It is simply first-come, which is why the calendar decides almost everything here: three jobs run in parallel, and only one of them can afford to wait.
Classes
Finish enrollment with the registrar first — a schedule cannot be built for a student the system does not yet have. The course requests are already submitted, so the appointment with the counselor who covers E through L is about confirming them and settling placement — and placement is set by the August assessments and the transcript, not by the conversation.
Registrar first, counselor second
Sports
Fall practice started before the first day of school, so this is the one that cannot wait. Register on FamilyID, pay the season fee, get the CHSAA physical on file, then get cleared by the Athletic Director. Eligibility itself is clean: a first-time ninth grader carries no transfer penalty.
The physical is the bottleneck
Electives
Requested at the same schedule build, out of whatever seats are left, which means the popular sections are the ones that go first. The CCT magnet has a freshman on-ramp a late enrollee can still step onto — but only if somebody says the words out loud at the appointment.
Ask for the CCT elective by name
Steps before an athlete can be cleared to practice
Per sport season, or $26 with approved free-and-reduced lunch
Clubs, most of them meeting at lunch
What decides placement
Placement is the part of a late enrollment that is genuinely hard to undo, and two of the three levers are pulled in August rather than on paper. Math is placed by assessment: TJ gives the math placement test to incoming DPS eighth graders and to out-of-district students during 9th Grade Academy, and that score is what separates Integrated Math 1 from Math 1 Honors and Math 2 Honors. Nothing about it can be settled in advance, which also means nothing is lost by having arrived late.
World language works the same way. There is a placement test, and a student who already did middle-school Spanish or French can test straight into Level 2 or higher rather than repeating Level 1 — a year he would not get back. The transcript still matters here, as the evidence that the test is worth giving.
Honors is neither: it is a request. TJ runs more than 40 honors and AP courses, the honors track is open to freshmen, and dropping an AP, honors or concurrent enrollment class later takes a drop form plus teacher and administrator permission. Easier to ask for it now than to move up in October.
- World language
- Spanish, French, Japanese, Level 1 through AP, plus Spanish for Heritage Speakers. Prior middle-school study should mean Level 2 or higher
- Math
- Placed from the transcript — worth checking against the Colorado sequence, which does not match California's
- Honors & AP
- 40+ courses, and an honors track available to ninth graders. Requested, not assigned
- Registration
- In person 9 a.m.–noon Monday to Thursday, or online through the registrar. Not complete until every required document is in
- The schedule itself
- Handed out at 9th Grade Academy in the week before school. If enrollment finalises close to those dates, say so in advance
Cleared to practice
Fall sports for boys are football, soccer, cross country, golf and tennis, and registration runs through FamilyID. Three things have to be true before a coach can put him on the field, and they are checked against a live cleared-to-try-out list, not a memory of a phone call.
- Register the athlete on FamilyID. This is the record everything else attaches to.
- Pay the season fee on MySchoolBucks. $92 per sport season, or $26 with approved free-and-reduced lunch.
- Get the CHSAA physical on file. Uploaded, emailed to the athletics treasurer, or handed over as a hard copy.
Then a transcript review and the Athletic Director's approval, and he is cleared. Confirm that last step with the AD directly rather than assuming the paperwork arrived.
CHSAA accepts only the official CHSAA pre-participation form, pages one through four, and it is valid for 365 days. Not a school physical, not a camp form. DPS students can get one free at the Denver Health school-based clinic inside TJ (720-423-7190); Place Bridge Academy (720-424-2050) and the Evie Dennis Campus (720-423-7610) also run them.
This is the step that quietly ends fall seasons, because the appointment is the part you cannot compress. Book it before anything else on this page.
Eligibility is not the problem
It is worth saying plainly, because "moved from out of state" sounds like it should cost something. It does not. Under CHSAA's Article 18 a student entering high school for the first time is eligible for all interscholastic competition, and the non-participation and non-member-school bylaws each confirm it independently. A first-time ninth grader is not a transfer student, needs no waiver, and skips the transfer registration step that applies to tenth through twelfth graders.
What the Athletic Director still needs is mundane: the CHSAA rules acknowledgment, the parent consent, and the physical, all on file before the first practice.
Electives, and the door into CCT
Ninth graders can reach most of the elective catalogue, and a late enrollee reaches whatever still has seats. Ask the counselor to prioritise the top two or three and to waitlist anything full, rather than accepting the first available substitute.
The one worth naming specifically is CCT — the Center for Communication Technology, the magnet TJ has run since 1994. The formal magnet designation goes through SchoolChoice, but the freshman on-ramp does not: any enrolled student can request CCT Foundations, in either the media, journalism and design strand or the computer science and game design strand, and taking one keeps the door open for the following year.
With one caveat that matters for a late enrollee, and it is in the course list in TJ's own words: seat priority goes to students who have requested to enroll in the CCT Magnet. Requesting the magnet and requesting the course are two different asks, and doing only the second puts him behind everyone who did both.
The full freshman catalogue, department by department with the fees attached, is set out in the next section.
Two useful pieces of trivia, both of which free a slot: JROTC can count toward the PE requirement, and so can a single athletic season — one season waives one semester, but the waiver has to go in immediately after the season ends, and it cannot be done in senior year. And clubs are the cheap version of all of this — roughly forty of them, mostly at lunch, joined by talking to the sponsor rather than filling in a form. That makes them the easiest thing in the building for a new student to walk into during the first week.
The Course List
Seven classes, and what he picked them from.
TJ's freshman course list came with a virtual selection form, and it has been filled in and sent. Everything below is the menu it was chosen from, kept here because the next conversation with the counselor is about these exact course names — and because offerings can still be adjusted before the fall based on demand, budgeting and other factors, so a request is not the same thing as a seat.
A full freshman schedule is seven classes. Four of them are effectively decided for him — English, math, a science and a social studies pairing are all requirements he will carry every year or nearly every year — which means the real choosing happens in the remaining three, and one of those has to be a fine art or a CTE course to keep the graduation ledger straight.
What has to be on the ledger by 2030
Worth reading once now rather than in junior year, because two of these are quietly expensive if they slip: the fine art or CTE year, and the world language. Neither has to happen in ninth grade, but both are much easier to fit early.
- English
- Four years, all four years of high school
- Math
- Four years, all four years of high school
- Science
- Three years, two of them lab sciences — biology, chemistry or physics. A fourth is recommended
- Social studies
- Three years, including a semester each of civics and government, cultural studies, conflict and healing, and personal finance. A fourth is recommended
- Fine art or CTE
- One year, required
- Physical education
- One year, two semesters
- Health
- One semester
- World language
- Not required, but completing level 2 is strongly advised — and two years or more is what college admissions expects
- Competency
- Two years in a CTE pathway, or a career certification, can satisfy it
The freshman catalogue
Every course open to a ninth grader, as TJ lists them, with the fees and the prerequisites that actually gate entry. Course descriptions are compressed to the line that changes a decision; the promo videos on TJ's electives page are the long version.
English
Required all four years
- English 1 Honors Full year
Math
Required all four years. Placement assessment given during 9th Grade Academy in August, to DPS eighth graders and out-of-district students alike
- Integrated Math 1 Full year
- Integrated Math 1 Honors Full year
- Integrated Math 2 Honors Full year · must qualify on the assessment, or pass Math 1 Honors
Science
Three years to graduate, two of them lab sciences. A fourth is recommended
- Biology Lab science · full year
- Biology Honors Lab science · full year
Social Studies
Three years to graduate, a fourth recommended
- Introduction to Ethnic Studies One semester, paired with A History of Power, Conflict and Healing · fulfils the cultural studies requirement
- Introduction to Ethnic Studies Honors One semester, paired with the honors History of Power, Conflict and Healing
World Language
All year-long. A placement test can move a student straight into a higher level — the lever worth using here
- Spanish 1 Can test into a higher level
- Spanish 2 Spanish 1, or the placement test score
- Honors Spanish 3 Spanish 2, or the placement test score
- Honors Spanish 4 Spanish 3
- Spanish Language Arts 2 For students who read, write, speak and understand Spanish fluently as a first language
- French 1 Can test into a higher level
- French 2 French 1, or the placement test score
- Honors French 3 French 2, or the placement test score
- Honors French 4 French 3
- Japanese 1 Level 1 only for freshmen
CCT Magnet
Center for Communication Technology. These count toward the fine art or CTE year. Seat priority goes to students who requested the CCT Magnet
- CCT Foundations — Media, Journalism & Design Full year · digital media, journalism and design, and the careers behind them
- CCT Foundations — Computer Science & Game Design Full year · coding, computer science and game design
- Digital Electronics Honors — Robotics 1 $60Full year · applied engineering design, control systems, the engineering design process
- CTE Digital Audio Tech Honors — Audio Production Full year · hands-on lab: audio software, equipment, music theory
- Video Production 1 Honors — Digital Media $30Two semesters · video and photography, motion graphics, audio
- Commercial Photography I Honors $30Full year · studio work, DSLR operation, lighting and styling, portfolio pieces
- Coding 1 Honors — Game Design & Development
CTE — Business
Two years in a CTE pathway, or a certification, can satisfy the competency requirement
- Principles of Marketing Honors — DECA $25Full year · the fee is DECA membership
CTE — Biomedical Science
- Principles of Biomedical Science A Human medicine, research process and bioinformatics: body systems, heart disease, diabetes, sickle cell, hypercholesterolemia, infectious disease
Performing Arts
Fulfils the fine art or CTE year
- Intro to Performing Arts A survey across dance, theatre and music
Music — Instrumental
- Band $60Full year · winds and percussion, beginning to intermediate
- Band Honors $75Full year · audition, contact Ms. Morrissey at robin_johnson@dpsk12.net · pep band plays home football and basketball
- Beginning Piano Skills $20Full year
- Beginning String Orchestra $60Full year · violin, viola, cello, double bass
- Honors String Orchestra $75Full year · audition, contact Ms. Morrissey · a major research paper or project each semester
Music — Vocal
- Choir $40Full year
- Choir Honors $40Full year · audition, contact Ms. Reed at tambyr_reed@dpsk12.net
Theater Arts
- Theater 1 Full year · open to anyone, with or without experience
Visual Arts
Fulfils the fine art or CTE year. Demand is high enough that taking more than one at a time needs counselor permission
- Ceramics 1 $40Full year
- Drawing / Painting 1 $40Full year
Physical Education
One year required. One athletic season waives one semester, but the waiver must be turned in immediately after the season ends, and never in senior year
- Functional Fitness — Bodyworks $10Full year · aerobics, strength, barre, yoga, TRX, plus nutrition and stress management
- Dance and Human Movement $10Full year · ballet, modern, West African, jazz, hip hop, choreography · counts as PE
- Team / Life Activities $10Full year · flag football, soccer, tennis, softball, gym hockey, basketball, volleyball, badminton, archery
- Fitness & Conditioning — Weight Training $10Full year · resistance training, endurance, speed, agility, programme design
- Beginning Swimming, then Intermediate $10Fall then spring semester · non-swimmers welcome, includes basic rescue skills
JROTC
- LET 1 Full year · can count toward the PE requirement. History, customs and leadership in the fall; communication, conflict resolution, financial planning, fitness and first aid in the spring
Additional Electives
- AVID 9 Full year · a college-preparatory support elective — tutorials, note-taking, collaborative work, test prep and college planning alongside a rigorous course load
Multilingual Education
Placed by ACCESS score, not chosen
- ELD 2B Required at ACCESS 1.0–2.4 · earns no English credit, pairs with Beginner ELD
- ELD Seminar Required at ACCESS 2.5–5.0
Three things that apply across the whole list. Every fee above can be reduced or waived if the student qualifies for free and reduced lunch — the same test that takes the athletics fee from $92 to $26. Dropping an AP, honors or concurrent enrollment course later requires a drop form plus teacher and administrator permission, so an honors request is a commitment for at least a semester. And TJ's own note on the list is worth repeating: offerings may be adjusted before the fall based on demand, budgeting and other factors.
Reproduced from the freshman course list TJ provided. The school's electives page carries promo videos for most of these, and the counselor holds the current credit-mapping sheet — check both against this page before treating any line here as final.
Ninth Grade Academy
Four mornings in August, two weeks before anyone else.
Monday 10 to Thursday 13 August, 8 a.m. to noon, at the school. TJ has run it for eighteen years: upperclassmen lead it, freshmen walk the building before it is full of eight hundred other people, and the week ends with a schedule in hand, TJ swag, and 2.5 elective credits already on the transcript. The district's own evaluation is unusually blunt about why it exists — students who attend do better academically, are more attached to the school and their peers, and are more likely to graduate.
For a student arriving from California two weeks before the first bell, it is the single highest-leverage thing on this entire page. It is also the one with a roster problem.
Mornings, 8 a.m. to noon, all four expected
Elective credits for completing the week
Years TJ has been running it
Every incoming freshman is auto-enrolled in the Academy — which is exactly the problem. The roster is generated from students who were already enrolled, and a SchoolChoice Round 2 placement in early August is not on it. Nobody will notice, and nobody will call. Getting added is two steps and both have to happen this week.
- Finish in-person enrollment at TJ first. This is a hard prerequisite — a student has to be fully registered before participating. It is also what generates the DPS student ID, the class schedule and the Chromebook. Registrar Peg O'Keefe, 720-423-7079.
- Then ask to be added. Email site leader Kyler Jackson at kjackso@dpsk12.net, copying the district at ninth-grade-academy.groups@dpsk12.net, or leave a message on the DPS Ninth Grade Academy hotline, 720-424-8277.
What that email needs to contain
This is the exact set of fields the district's registration messages ask for, so sending it complete the first time saves a round trip in a week that does not have room for one. Add one question at the end that the standard form does not cover.
- School
- Thomas Jefferson High School
- Student
- Full legal name
- DPS student ID
- Assigned at enrollment — say "pending" if the call to the registrar has not happened yet, rather than waiting to send
- Contact
- Home address and phone
- Context
- Placed at TJ through SchoolChoice Round 2, enrollment in progress
- The ask
- Add him to the Aug 10–13 roster
- The question
- If he can only attend part of the week, what does partial attendance earn against the 2.5 credits? That is decided case by case by the site leader, so it has to be asked, not assumed
Monday morning
Report to the main entrance at 3950 S Holly St at 8 a.m. There will be staff and student ambassadors in the lobby directing people; the exact room comes in the site leader's email to registered families about a week out. If that email has not arrived by Friday the 7th, call the main office rather than assuming he is on the list.
- Bring
- Water bottle, something to write with, and his Chromebook if he already has one. If not, TJ issues one on the first or second day
- Wear
- Standard DPS dress code, and dress to be active — team-building runs in the gym and outdoors. Phones and earbuds stay in the backpack during sessions
- Food
- Snacks are provided; extra is welcome. No lunch on an 8-to-noon day
- Cost
- Free
- Getting there
- Drop-off is normal, and DPS provides free RTD passes for students who need them during the Academy. Ask the site leader
- Parents
- It is a student programme — drop off and go. TJ lists no parent session this year
What the four mornings actually cover
The Academy is student-led, which is most of the point: the people explaining the building are the ones who were lost in it last year. Across the week it works through the tour, the culture, the paperwork of being a high school student, and the part that does not fit on a list — knowing faces before the first day.
- Building tours Classrooms, lockers, where things are
- Culture and expectations The handbook, and the norms that are not in it
- Graduation requirements, GPA and transcripts How to read the thing that decides everything later
- The online platforms Schoology for grades, and the DPS email account he will be expected to check
- Team and community building Gym and outdoors — the reason for the dress-to-be-active note
- Meeting teachers, counselors and administrators Plus the other freshmen, which is the real deliverable
- Schedule review and pickup Handed out during the week
If the schedule is not ready in time
A late enrollee may reach Monday without a built schedule. Go anyway. The tours, the culture sessions and the peer mentoring are the parts that cannot be caught up later, and none of them depend on having a timetable. Check the DPS student portal mid-week and pick the schedule up from counseling once it exists.
And if TJ says enrollment cannot be finished before the 10th, ask two specific questions rather than accepting the answer: can he attend provisionally while the paperwork finishes, and what is the make-up path for the 2.5 credits.
What is confirmed, and what is inference. The dates, the 8 a.m. to noon window, auto-enrollment, schedule pickup, the 2.5 credits and TJ swag, the eighteen years, and Kyler Jackson as site leader all come from TJ's own Ninth Grade Academy page for 2026-27. The daily shape of the week, the snacks, the RTD passes, the Chromebook timing and the report location are drawn from prior TJ language and from sister DPS schools whose pages repeat the model almost verbatim — George Washington, Northfield, Denver School of the Arts, Manual and East. Reliable, but not TJ-2026 verbatim on every point.
No public hour-by-hour agenda exists for any DPS school; the real daily schedule arrives in the site leader's email to registered families about a week out. One stale detail worth knowing: some cached search results still list Erin Thompson and 720-423-7179 as the NGA contact. She is now a TJ counselor covering P–R. Use Kyler Jackson for anything Academy-related.
Action Plan
Which week, and who to call.
The awkward shape of an August arrival is that the school year and the sports year do not start together. Fall practice opens three weeks before the first bell, orientation sits in between, and the paperwork that unlocks both has to be finished before either. Laid out on a calendar it stops looking like a scramble.
Everything dated below is the fall. The winter sports clock runs three months behind it and has its own set of deadlines — those, and what to do with the months in between, are in Spartan Basketball.
- Aug 3
- Football and boys golf begin practice
- Aug 5
- First boys golf contest
- Aug 10
- Cross country, boys soccer, softball, boys tennis, girls volleyball and gymnastics begin practice
- Aug 10–13
- 9th Grade Academy, 8 a.m.–noon. Every incoming freshman is enrolled automatically — which is exactly why a Round 2 placement has to ask to be added
- Aug 13
- First softball and boys tennis contests
- Aug 20
- First cross country and boys soccer contests; football Zero Week
- Aug 25
- First day of school, K through 12
- Aug 27
- Football Week 1
Finish the paperwork, book the physical
- Close out enrollment with the registrar: birth certificate, proof of address plus landlord letter, the Pescadero transcript and attendance record, vaccination records, and the JDF 751 custody forms. Ask for three things on the way out — the DPS student ID number, when the schedule will be ready, and when the Chromebook is issued.
- Ask to be added to the Ninth Grade Academy roster, the same day. Auto-enrollment does not reach a Round 2 placement, and the Academy starts before school does.
- If any fall sport is wanted, register on FamilyID, pay the fee, and book the CHSAA physical the same day. Practices have already begun.
- Email the Athletic Director: a first-time ninth grader, new from out of state, interested in a named sport. Ask her to confirm clearance once the registration and physical land, and to pass on the coach's contact and practice times.
- Email Maggie Kennedy — the counselor for E through L — to confirm the submitted course requests landed and to book the schedule build. Attach the transcript and say plainly which requests matter most: the honors lines, the world-language level, and CCT Foundations, which is the one with a seat-priority queue ahead of him.
Into the building before anyone else
- 9th Grade Academy, 8 a.m. to noon: building tours, expectations, graduation requirements, GPA and transcripts — and the schedule itself. Watch for the site leader's email a week out; if nothing has arrived by Friday the 7th, call the office.
- The math placement assessment happens here, for out-of-district students as well as DPS eighth graders. It is the thing that decides Integrated Math 1 versus Math 1 Honors versus Math 2 Honors, and it cannot be taken early. Ask about the world-language placement test at the same time.
- First fall-sport practices, if he is cleared.
- Chromebook pickup, fees on MySchoolBucks, ID photo. TJ has not published 2026-27 dates for these, so confirm them with the registrar rather than assuming.
- Ask about club sign-ups while everyone is standing right there.
Fix what the hand-built schedule got wrong
- Read the schedule against the transcript. The add/drop window is the cheap moment to correct a placement or swap an elective; October is not.
- If a sport is being dropped, request the refund before he plays in any scrimmage or game, and inside the first two weeks.
- Go to a couple of clubs at lunch. It is the lowest-cost way into a building where everyone else already knows each other.
Where the plan bends
Three things can go differently, and none of them is fatal if it is spotted in the same week rather than in September.
- Elective full
- Ask for the waitlist and a named alternate. CCT Foundations and the visual arts fill first — CCT because magnet requests are served ahead of course requests, visual arts because demand there already needs counselor permission to double up
- Not on the NGA roster
- Email the site leader and the district hotline the same day, and ask what partial attendance earns. If enrollment cannot close before Aug 10, ask whether he can attend provisionally and what the make-up path for the credits is
- No physical in time
- Expedite through the free clinic at TJ. Registration, fee and physical must all be complete before he can be cleared — two out of three clears nobody
- Full CCT magnet wanted
- Not just the course: talk to the counselor and the CCT department about the magnet designation, which is also what moves him up the seat-priority queue for CCT Foundations. Taking the course keeps the door open regardless
The people who can actually unblock this
Published school directory contacts, current for 2026-27. The main line is (720) 423-7000, and the building is at 3950 S Holly St.
Counselors, by last name
The counselor is assigned alphabetically, and that assignment is what determines who builds the schedule. A surname beginning with G lands in the E–L band, which makes Margaret "Maggie" Kennedy the person to email — not the front desk, and not whoever answers first.
Two things can still move it. Assignments are re-cut year to year, and a two-part surname can be filed under either half, so confirm the band at registration before a week disappears into the wrong inbox.
- A – D
- Jillian Gleason · jillian_gleason@dpsk12.net
- E – L
- Margaret "Maggie" Kennedy · margaret_kennedy@dpsk12.net — the band that applies here
- M – O
- rjacks2@dpsk12.net · also students in the ELA-S Spanish language-acquisition pathway
- P – R
- Erin Thompson · ethomps@dpsk12.net · also students with an IEP
- S – Z
- Jeremy Anderson · jeremy_anderson@dpsk12.net
Read this part before relying on the rest. TJ had not published 2026-27 dates for Chromebook pickup, ID photos, or a standalone schedule pick-up day beyond 9th Grade Academy at the time of writing; confirm them with the registrar.
Counselor last-name assignments shift from year to year, and the $92 fee and the CHSAA form requirement are taken from TJ's current athletics page — amounts and forms can change by season. CHSAA sub-bylaw numbering has also moved between editions (1800.42 was formerly 1800.52) with the substance unchanged, so for anything being filed officially, verify against the live bylaw book through the Athletic Director.
Getting There
The 65, and the honest arithmetic.
Home and school sit almost exactly three and a half miles apart on the same street: south down Holly, and you are there. No RTD route runs down Holly. That single fact shapes everything below, because it turns a straight line into a dogleg — east to Monaco, south to Hampden, and back west again.
So this section does something the rest of the page does not: it tells you the bus is the second-best answer. Door to door it is about 55 minutes against 24 minutes on a bike down the same corridor. What the bus is genuinely good for is the other days — the snow, the dark, the flat tire, and the night a game finishes at nine — and it is much better than 55 minutes if the bike comes along on the rack.
The fare. Everyone 19 and under rides RTD free, permanently, with an ID
Minutes between buses on the 65, most of the day, both directions
Minutes door to door in the morning, of which 41 are on foot
RTD's Zero Fare for Youth programme makes travel free for everyone 19 and under — a pilot in 2023, made permanent by the RTD board. There is nothing to buy and no pass to load. He does need to be able to show a current school ID or a government-issued ID to the operator or a fare inspector, which is one more reason the DPS student ID that comes out of enrolment matters early.
The morning, to the 8:20 bell
One bus, no transfer, and two long walks. These are RTD's scheduled times for the current service period, read off the published timetable rather than estimated.
- 7:02 a.m. — leave the house. It is 0.73 mi to the stop, about 15 minutes on foot, east across Holly to Monaco.
- 7:17 a.m. — board the 65 southbound at S Monaco Pkwy & Mississippi Ave, towards DTC. Buses run about every 30 minutes.
- 7:32 a.m. — off at Southmoor Station, Gate B. Fifteen minutes on the bus.
- 7:58 a.m. — at the school door. The catch: Southmoor is 0.42 mi from TJ as the crow flies but 1.29 mi on foot, about 26 minutes, because I-25 and Hampden sit in between and the crossing is a detour.
- 8:20 a.m. — first bell, with 22 minutes to spare. The next bus down, boarding 7:47, does not make it.
- The 6:44
- The earlier southbound gets him to the door at 7:23 — an hour before the bell, but the safe one on a morning that cannot go wrong
- The 7:47
- Reaches Southmoor at 8:02, which is 8:28 at the door. Eight minutes late. There is no third option in between
- Route 11
- Stops 4 minutes from the front door on S Holly St, and is useless here — it runs east and west along Mississippi, never south
- Hampden & Holly
- The stop that should be the answer: routes 35 and 40, and only 0.48 mi from TJ, a 9-minute walk. Nothing from home reaches it in the morning without a transfer that arrives too late
Coming home, including after practice
The evening is where the bus earns its place, because it keeps running long after anyone would want to make that ride in the dark — and because the Hampden & Holly stop, useless in the morning, becomes the good option once there is a bus to meet.
- After the 3:20 bell
- Leave at 3:30, walk to Southmoor, 65 northbound at 3:56, off at Monaco & Mississippi 4:12, home about 4:27 — 57 minutes
- After a 6 p.m. practice
- Leave 6:09, route 35 from Hampden & Holly at 6:18, change to the 65 at Monaco & Newport at 6:31, home about 7:00. Fifty minutes, and the shortest walk of the day
- After a 9 p.m. game
- Leave 9:36, the 35 at 9:45, the 65 at 10:04, home about 10:31. It works, and it is a long way in the dark for a fourteen-year-old — this is the trip to drive
- Last buses
- The 65 runs northbound out of Southmoor until 11:04 p.m. and southbound past Mississippi until 12:15 a.m. Late is covered; it is the walking at either end that is not
Forty-one of those fifty-five morning minutes are spent walking, and a bike on the front rack deletes almost all of them: three minutes to the stop instead of fifteen, five minutes from Southmoor instead of twenty-six. It also means one missed bus costs half an hour of waiting rather than the whole plan, because he can simply ride on.
Every RTD bus has a rack, on the front, holding two bikes — the only exception is the 16th Street MallRide, which is nowhere near this trip.
Putting a bike on the bus
The rack folds down from the front of the bus. Load from the kerb, never the traffic side; squeeze the arm over the front tire; then get on and pay attention at your stop, because the driver cannot see the rack well and will not remind you. Tell the driver you are loading — it is not in the rules, but it is why the bus waits.
- Two per bus
- "Our bike racks can hold two bicycles, battery-powered e-bikes, or e-scooters." First come, first served — if it is full, the next 65 is 30 minutes behind
- Weight limit
- 55 lb per bicycle. A normal hybrid or mountain bike is 25–35 lb and fine. A heavy e-bike is the one to measure before relying on this
- Tire width
- Up to 2.3 inches. This rules out fat-tire bikes, which start around 3.8 in — the rack physically will not close on them
- Lift it yourself
- "You must be able to lift the bike and place it on the rack yourself." A rack is chest-high on a fourteen-year-old; worth one practice run in a car park before a school morning
- Never inside
- "Bikes are not allowed inside RTD buses at any time." Nor may you lock a bike to the rack. RTD is explicitly not responsible for a bike lost, stolen or badly loaded
- Trains are different
- On light rail and commuter rail, bikes and e-bikes come inside the carriage, in the marked areas. Southmoor is an E-line station, so that matters the day the trip goes downtown
- E-bike rules
- Electric only, with a sealed, undamaged battery compartment. No gasoline and no lead-acid. No charging on board
- Not any bike
- Rented and dockless bikes — a Lime or a bike-share machine — are not allowed on any RTD vehicle, racks included
One stop-level detail worth knowing before it costs a morning: a handful of stops are marked "Non-bicycle stop", where the driver will not deploy the rack because there is no safe place to stand. Neither end of this trip is one, but a new stop downtown might be.
The bike route itself — 3.9 miles, about 24 minutes, 1.7 of them on the High Line Canal Trail rather than in traffic — is drawn on the map in Visit, alongside the ride to Grandma's.
Every time on this page is a scheduled time, computed from RTD's own published GTFS feed for the service period running 7 June to 26 September 2026 — not a guess, and not real-time. RTD reshuffles its network roughly three times a year, so check these against the live schedule before term starts; the trip planner below is the authority, and the numbers here will drift.
Walking distances and geometry come from OpenStreetMap by way of BRouter, timed at a steady 3 mph — a fit teenager in a hurry will beat them, and a January morning will not. The 8:20 and 3:20 bells are TJ's published hours. Fare rules, rack capacity, the 55 lb and 2.3 in limits and the e-bike conditions are quoted from RTD's own Bike-n-Ride and Zero Fare for Youth pages, and RTD can change any of them.
Visit
Find TJ in southeast Denver.
- Address
- 3950 S Holly St
Denver, CO 80237
- Phone
- (720) 423-7000
- Contact & staff
- Reach the office →
- District
- Denver Public Schools
Grades 9–12
- Official site
- tjhs.dpsk12.org →
- Events & calendar
- See what's on →
- Athletics
- Spartan Athletics →
- Mascot & colors
- Spartans · Brown & Gold
- Founded
- 1960
- Get directions
- Open in Maps →
- The proposed family home
- 5495 Nebraska Way
Denver, CO 80246
View the listing →
- Grandma's
- 1939 S Quebec Way, #602
Denver, CO 80231
Fourteen, and already independent
Put a fourteen-year-old at 5495 Nebraska Way and the three places that make up his week stop depending on anyone's calendar. School is 3.9 miles south, about 24 minutes on a class 1 e-bike. Colorado sets no minimum age for class 1 and 2 e-bikes, so this is a ride he can legally make himself, today, without a licence and without a lift.
The honest version of that ride is worth stating, because the trail does not run to the door. It is roughly a mile of ordinary residential streets south and east to pick up the High Line Canal Trail near Bible Park, then 1.7 miles of car-free trail, then a little over a mile of streets again to reach Holly and the school. Call it 44 percent of the trip away from traffic, with the connecting bits on quiet neighbourhood roads rather than arterials.
Grandma's at 1939 S Quebec Way works out much the same, 3.5 miles and about 18 minutes, again with roughly a mile and a half on the canal. School to Grandma's is the exception: 4.1 miles in around 18 minutes, but the canal barely helps on that heading, so it is a street ride. Hover any dashed line on the map and it will tell you the split.
Where the trail is too far out of the way, the fallback is not a parent. RTD is free for riders 19 and under, buses carry bikes on the front rack, and light rail takes them aboard, so the pattern that actually works is ride to the station, load the bike, ride off the other end. Between the canal, the free fare and a battery, a fourteen-year-old's radius stops being whatever a parent can drive and starts being most of southeast Denver.