This paper discusses the historical progression of the transformation of Colorado's public education system from one that prioritizes providing excellent academic outcomes for students into one that prioritizes meeting the non-academic health and welfare needs of students. This paper explains how the Colorado public education system's transformation into a welfare-based system has been influenced by U.S. government policies underlying federal programs and legislation that reflect welfare values. The paper demonstrates that Colorado public schools are now used as vehicles for the redistribution of funds within the state to achieve federal adopted social service policies and goals rather than state level academic policies and goals for Colorado's students and educators. This paper presents arguments and possible solutions for returning the Colorado public education system to its original priority of delivering strong academic experiences to students by correcting the current misalignment between federally funded or mandated programs and Colorado's locally-derived public school values, needs and priorities.