Wow, you are sooo lucky to be moving to Denver...think beautiful mountains for the weekend, versus the flattest of lands!!
I just moved from DFW to Austin (as close as I can get to Colorado right now---topography-wise) and I did exactly what TL is recommending to you: I put an Austin zipcode into a new Mamasource registration and had an Austin community of mamas to which I could ask my questions about Austin neighborhoods, schools, etc, and then once I was here, I received great doctors recommendations from those mamas!!
I also looked on the state's Texas Education Agency website http://www.tea.state.tx.us/index.aspx to see the "accountability ratings", which showed me the history of a school's ratings, i.e. whether a particular school has been CONSISTENTLY rated as at least "recognized", if not "exemplary" (there are multi-year reports to look at in Texas). Yes, these ratings are based on standardized testing, but it's the only way I know to compare schools.
I'm sure that Colorado has the same type of website. Just search for Colorado + education and it's bound to be the top listing.
Once I had a list of schools that were acceptable to me, I supplied that list to our realtor, who was able to search for homes for sale with the schools as one of the criteria!!!
Well, I hope this helps you. Good luck in your move!
Oh, one more thing...I think since the national housing market is seriously hurting, this may be the perfect time to purchase a home where prices would have MOST corrected...which would be the more expensive areas...as long as you feel you'll be there for a few years ('cause who knows where the bottom of this market will be before it goes back up again), then you may be able to make some dough when the market recovers...
Have fun!
D.