Denver Youth Mental Health and School Attendance Statistics
Key finding
In the 2025-26 school year, 36.6% of Denver Public Schools students were chronically absent, against 27.5% statewide. In fall 2025, 19.4% of Denver high school students reported persistent sadness or hopelessness. Among Denver adults, 22.7% have been told they have depression, by CDC estimates.
In crisis or thinking about suicide? Call or text 988 now (in Colorado it reaches the 988 Colorado Mental Health Line). If you are in immediate danger, call 911.
Key Denver statistics at a glance
- 36.6%of Denver Public Schools K-12 students were chronically absent in 2025-26 (missed 10% or more of enrolled days). Statewide: 27.5%.Colorado Department of Education, 2025-26
- 6.3%truancy rate in Denver Public Schools in 2025-26, against 3.5% statewide.Colorado Department of Education, 2025-26
- 19.4%of Denver high school students felt so sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more that they stopped some usual activities (fall 2025). Statewide: 21.8%.Healthy Kids Colorado Survey (CDPHE), 2025
- 79.4%of Denver high school students have an adult to go to for help with a serious problem (fall 2025).Healthy Kids Colorado Survey (CDPHE), 2025
- 22.7%of Denver adults have been told by a health professional that they have a depressive disorder (CDC estimate, 2023 data).CDC PLACES, 2025 release
- 15.2%of Denver adults had frequent mental distress: 14 or more days of poor mental health in the past 30 (CDC estimate, 2023 data).CDC PLACES, 2025 release
School attendance
Chronic absence counts every missed day, for any reason, so it is a broad measure of how much school students miss, not a measure of mental health. Denver Public Schools’ rate fell from a peak of 43.2% in 2021-22 to 36.6% in 2025-26. Absence rises through high school: 48.5% of DPS 12th graders were chronically absent in 2025-26. Our chronic absence study has every year since 2018-19 and every grade.
| District | Chronically absent | Truancy rate | Attendance rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Denver Public Schools | 36.6% | 6.3% | 89.4% |
| Aurora Public Schools | 38.5% | 6.0% | 89.2% |
| Jeffco Public Schools | 26.2% | 2.8% | 91.6% |
| Cherry Creek School District | 22.3% | 2.8% | 92.4% |
| Boulder Valley School District | 19.4% | 1.4% | 93.2% |
| Douglas County School District | 15.2% | 1.3% | 93.9% |
| Colorado (statewide) | 27.5% | 3.5% | 91.5% |
Chronically absent = missed 10% or more of enrolled days, excused or not. Source: Colorado Department of Education, 2025-26 attendance data.
How Denver teens are feeling
The Healthy Kids Colorado Survey asks students about their health every two years. In fall 2025, Denver high school students reported lower rates than the state on most measures, and most Denver figures were better than in 2021. Our Healthy Kids Colorado Survey study shows the trend since 2019, margins of error and five other metro areas.
| Measure | Denver County | Colorado |
|---|---|---|
| Felt sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more (past year) | 19.4% | 21.8% |
| Poor mental health most of the time or always (past 30 days) | 18.0% | 23.1% |
| Stress level is manageable most days | 62.8% | 61.0% |
| Hurt themselves on purpose without wanting to die (past year) | 7.9% | 11.2% |
| Seriously considered suicide (past year) | 6.3% | 9.6% |
| Made a suicide plan (past year) | 5.2% | 7.4% |
| Attempted suicide (past year) | 3.5% | 4.6% |
| Bullied on school property (past year) | 9.2% | 12.8% |
| Bullied electronically (past year) | 6.4% | 8.8% |
| Have an adult to go to for help with a serious problem | 79.4% | 77.7% |
| Would contact a crisis line if worried about their own or a friend's mental health | 26.4% | 26.3% |
Percent of high school students. Source: Healthy Kids Colorado Survey, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE). Margins of error are in the CSV download.
Adults in Denver and the metro area
CDC PLACES estimates health measures for every county from a national phone survey and a statistical model. By its estimates, 22.7% of Denver adults have been told they have a depressive disorder and 15.2% had frequent mental distress. Denver’s ranges overlap those of every other metro county here, so these estimates do not show a clear difference between them.
| County | Depression | Depression range | Frequent mental distress | Distress range |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Denver County | 22.7% | 20.0–25.5 | 15.2% | 13.2–17.3 |
| Arapahoe County | 21.7% | 19.0–24.4 | 15.9% | 14.0–17.9 |
| Adams County | 20.7% | 18.1–23.2 | 17.1% | 15.1–19.2 |
| Jefferson County | 23.1% | 20.4–25.7 | 14.8% | 12.9–16.8 |
| Boulder County | 23.3% | 20.5–26.4 | 15.2% | 13.1–17.5 |
| Broomfield County | 21.4% | 18.3–24.8 | 14.4% | 12.4–16.6 |
| Douglas County | 21.1% | 18.1–24.3 | 14.2% | 12.2–16.5 |
Percent of adults 18 and older (crude prevalence). Ranges are 95% confidence intervals. Source: CDC PLACES, 2025 release, based on 2023 survey data.
Why youth suicide deaths are not on this page yet
We planned to include youth suicide deaths in Colorado from CDC WONDER, the federal death records database. Its public data service does not allow queries by state, and the state’s own Colorado suicide statistics dashboard (opens in a new tab) does not offer its data for download, so we could not compute and re-check these figures the way we do for everything else on this page. The CDPHE dashboard is the place to look for them. The survey measures above include students’ own reports of suicidal thoughts and attempts.
Method and sources
- School attendance: Colorado Department of Education district and state attendance data for 2025-26. Figures are CDE’s own; see the chronic absence study for the files and method.
- Teen survey: Healthy Kids Colorado Survey high school results (all students) for Denver County and Colorado, fall 2025, from CDPHE’s dashboard. See the Healthy Kids Colorado Survey study for the method.
- Adults: CDC PLACES county estimates, 2025 release (based on 2023 data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System), downloaded on November 12, 2026. We show crude prevalence, the share of all adults, rather than the age-adjusted figures CDC also publishes.
- Checks: before publishing, separate scripts re-read the figures from different sources: CDE’s SchoolView pages, a second CDC PLACES dataset, and for the teen survey, CDPHE’s interactive dashboard and 2025 results page.
Limits
- These figures describe whole populations. They do not say anything about any one child, teen or adult, and none of them is a diagnosis.
- PLACES figures are modeled estimates for each county, not direct counts, and they cover adults, not teens.
- The survey reflects students in public schools who took part, and local figures have wider margins of error than statewide ones.
Cite this study
Suggested citation:
Mountainside Behavioral Health. (2026). Denver Youth Mental Health and School Attendance Statistics. https://mountainsidebh.com/research/denver-youth-mental-health-statistics/Download the data (CSV). The data behind this page is free to reuse, including commercially, with credit to Mountainside Behavioral Health and a link to this page (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (opens in a new tab)).
Sources
- Colorado Department of Education, Attendance and Truancy Statistics (opens in a new tab): 2025-26 school year.
- Colorado Department of Education, SchoolView district attendance pages (opens in a new tab): 2025-26 school year.
- Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE), Healthy Kids Colorado Survey dashboard (high school results) (opens in a new tab): 2019, 2021, 2023 and 2025 surveys.
- CDPHE, 2025 Healthy Kids Colorado Survey Results (opens in a new tab): fall 2025 survey.
- CDC, PLACES: Local Data for Better Health, County Data, 2025 release (opens in a new tab): 2023 survey data.
Looking for support in Denver?
Mountainside Behavioral Health works with children, teens, parents and adults, in Greenwood Village or by telehealth across Colorado. A free consultation is a chance to ask questions and see whether the fit is right.
Research pages describe whole populations from public data. They are general information, not medical advice, a diagnosis or a treatment plan, and they do not create a therapist-client relationship. Figures checked against the sources above on November 12, 2026.