Denisa R. Superville December 6, 2017. (2017, December 06). A District Leader With an Unwavering Commitment to Equity.

“It was such a pivotal moment for me to think you can be authentic to who you are as a person, and be educated, and make a difference, and get acclaim,” said Cordova, now the deputy superintendent in Denver’s public schools.That epiphany has driven Cordova in her two-decades-plus career in Denver, where she began as a bilingual language arts teacher and rose through the ranks to become the first Latina to hold the No. 2 job in the 92,000-student district. Cordova’s unwavering commitment to equity is apparent in her track record on English-language-learner education—including making sure that all school staff be trained in strategies to work with English-learners—and her forceful advocacy to preserve a federal policy that shields undocumented immigrants brought illegally to the United States as children from deportation.