Predicted large classes concern local parents

By Jennifer Eisenbart

Editor

After outlining the situation concerning class sizes for the youngest grades in the Burlington Area School District at Monday’s special School Board meeting, Superintendent Peter Smet made one thing clear.

There is not a principal or teacher within the district, he said, who wouldn’t prefer to be teaching class sizes in the teens, versus the 20s.

That is the situation facing the district now, in a somewhat peculiar fashion. While district class size averages in kindergarten through fourth grades are on target, the ranges are out of whack because of a handful of large classes at Winkler Elementary School.

According to data presented at the meeting, the district is predicting large classes in first, second and third grade at Winkler for the 2015-16 school year, as well as first, second and fourth grade at Cooper. Lyons has a slightly above average size (24) in third grade next year as well.

The issue lies with the district’s policy of neighborhood schools, where students generally attend the elementary school closest to their home. There are some exceptions – parents choosing to go to another school if they can, and students from the Dover area getting their choice of school because of the Dover Elementary closing several years ago.

The solutions as presented by the district Monday night include living with the current class sizes, reassigning or asking parents to switch children to other schools, hiring additional staff, ending the neighborhood school concept and clustering grades – or some combination of the above.

Adding staff would likely involve an operational referendum to raise taxes to fund more teachers.

Smet said all of the solutions have pros and cons.

Parents sound off

Smet also addressed a number of questions that had already been directed to the district, saying:

• Cooper is undergoing a minor room reconfiguration (not adding rooms);
• The district’s bus company does not determine which students go to a particular school; and
• Emails are not being blocked by the district – in fact, they are archived for seven years.

But the majority of the discussion came from concerned parents who took the floor – mostly from the Winkler School area. An additional kindergarten teacher was hired last year to split up a 26-student kindergarten class, but now that class will be combined into one first-grade section.

Several parents worried about how their sons or daughters would contend with the larger class size, as less individual attention would be available.

There were a number of suggestions as well. One parent suggested a teacher split over two or three grade levels, while another suggested combining grades and classrooms to get a better student/teacher ratio.

What Winkler parents stressed most, though, was they loved the school because of the smaller class sizes, and didn’t want to see economics determine the educational environment.

Several parents cited studies that showed student learn better in smaller class sizes. Others said their children needed the smaller class sizes in order to function. One woman also pointed out that her son has ADHD, and is working without an individualized education plan. She wondered whether other students were getting lost in that process as well, and whether determining those could help with a better educational environment for everyone.

Board President Jim Bousman stressed that the board would work for everyone.

“We will do the best that we can,” he said.

No action was taken at the meeting. The topic was originally scheduled to be discussed by the School Board Monday, but that has since been changed to June 22 at the Burlington High School library at 6:30 p.m.