Origin Story | Ednium

We’re Ednium: The Alumni Collective

We are an action-focused, community development organization started by a group of Denver Public Schools (DPS) alumni. We partner with public school alumni across the Denver metro area to change the way cities educate and reinvest in their homegrown talent.

Ednium was co-founded by DPS alumni TeRay Esquibel and Perla Bustillos, who believed that those who lived the public school experience should have a seat at the table shaping its future.

We’re a powerful coalition of young alumni navigating new jobs and careers, pursuing college and specialized training, and making big life decisions that would be easier if our K-12 education had better prepared us for life in the 21st Century.

Based on our lived experiences, we're working to ensure that every student leaves the system with the knowledge, skills, and agency to define and achieve success for themselves.

Through direct programming, authentic research, and collective action, Ednium creates spaces where Alumni grow in their leadership, build social capital, and influence the very systems that shaped them.

This will require collaboration across sectors, so we invite partners, policymakers, and community members to join us as we reinvest in the untapped brilliance of our city's public school alumni.

Why We Exist

Ednium: The Alumni Collective was born from the need to center the voices of those who've lived the public school experience. Alumni experience the immediate impact of their education, yet are rarely asked for input or involved in shaping improvements. We've seen who testifies at school board meetings, who influences public education decisions, and who gets heard, and far too often, it's not us.

If we want a more equitable, relevant education system, we must co-create space for public school alumni, especially those from marginalized communities, to lead the conversation and solutions.

Major Wins

Over the last several years, Ednium has grown from a powerful idea into a movement rooted in community voice, coalition-building, and real systems change. Here are some of our major wins.

Summer 2018: A group of 20 DPS alumni met with school board members during the superintendent search process.

Fall/Winter 2018: Superintendent Susana Cordova met with alumni to inform her entry plan and instructed DPS senior leadership to include more alumni voices in key processes.

Summer 2019: In partnership with the Denver Scholarship Foundation and funded by RootED, Ednium launched the inaugural Design Lab, bringing together 150+ DPS alumni to share educational experiences and develop policy priorities.

Fall/Winter 2019: Alumni presented their policy priorities to the Superintendent and senior leaders. This led to the creation of the Leadership Launchpad, a leadership development program built for and by alumni.

Spring 2020: Amid the Covid-19 pandemic, more than 20 alumni joined the founding Leadership Launchpad cohort to deepen their knowledge and build their social capital.

Summer 2020: Ednium: The Alumni Collective was officially born, launching with a strong alumni network, trusted district partnerships, and an advisory board dedicated to supporting homegrown talent.

Summer 2021: DPS approved a district-wide policy revision to require Financial Literacy and Cultural and Ethnic Studies as high school graduation requirements, an alumni-driven advocacy win. Ednium partnered with DPS to implement the curriculum.

Winter 2021: Ednium secured $350,000 from Next Gen Personal Finance to support the hiring of a Financial Literacy Specialist and provide professional development for educators.

Spring 2022: Launched our first strategic plan.

Spring 2022: Established the Connection Series of events.

Spring 2023: Launched the Alumni Council to help set alumni-driven policy goals and initiatives.

Winter 2023: The Homegrown Awards launches as the signature event celebrating homegrown talent in Denver.

Spring 2023: Ednium advocated to expand Prosperity Denver Fund eligibility to include DPS high school graduates, supporting certification programs, and raising the age limit from 25 to 30.

Spring 2024: Ednium led community conversations on making return-on-investment wage data from postsecondary institutions more accessible to students. After testifying in support of the transparency bill, we were invited to join the State Longitudinal Data Study governing board.

Summer 2024: Ednium partnered with Gary Community Ventures to release a request for proposals and identify schools that already offered a credential of value. Five metro area schools received grants to expand their efforts and ideas. The findings of our learning will be released in 2025.

Summer 2024: Ednium partnered with Emily Griffith Foundation on a research project focused on alumni experiences and outcomes.

Fall 2024: The Advocacy Accelerator launches for alumni who are willing to set the policy priorities of the organization while learning more about levers of power.

Fall 2024: Alumni Connect launches as a way to connect current students and alumni who want to give back.

Winter 2024: Denver Deep Dive launches as an opportunity for alumni to learn more about the systems around them.

Spring 2025: Ednium advocated for and helped pass a financial literacy graduation requirement for all high schoolers in Colorado as a state law.

Every student will leave the public school system with the knowledge, skills, and agency to define and achieve success for themselves.

Major Wins

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