One of the few educational issues about which there is no dispute is that the size of classes has a direct and measurable impact on the prospects of student’s success in the classroom. At the forefront of this fight in NYC, is Class Size Matters, an organization providing critical research and advocacy on this issue.
Its Executive Director, Leonie Haimson, works tirelessly to raise awareness of the compelling need to lower class size as a means to educational improvement. The following piece by Leonie Haimson appears with her consent:
During the fall of 2003, Randi Weingarten was the first person to mention to me the possibility of an audit by the State Comptroller’s office of the city’s use of the state class size funds.
We were sitting in court, listening to the lawyers argue, after the city had bumped our coalition’s first proposition off the ballot, that would have created a charter commission on class size. (Coincidentally, at the end of this month, our coalition will be back in court, arguing against the city’s attempt to keep another proposition off the ballot again — this time, to amend the city charter to require smaller classes in all grades.)
That same fall, after I had received numerous complaints from parents and others that class sizes had risen in their schools, I asked the NYC Independent Budget Office to analyze the data on class size and more particularly, the number of classes offered in each grade K-3. In the summer of 2004, after I had studied the state class size law more closely and received convincing evidence of the city’s violations from the IBO, I went to the State Comptroller’s office and asked them for an audit. When they were not forthcoming, I asked Randi to intercede.
Randi called Hevesi promptly to ask him for an audit, and when that didn’t produce results, later met with him personally and asked him again. Still, I never received actual confirmation from his office that they were indeed going to perform the audit until Jan. 05, when then-Speaker Gifford Miller, Councilmember Robert Jackson and Senator Eric Schneiderman publicly asked that the audit be performed.
WHAT DID THE AUDIT FIND? That DOE had been breaking the law in numerous ways. Though the city claimed to have formed 1556 additional classes each year in grades K-3 with almost $89 million in annual funds, there were actually only 20 more classes in these grades last year.
20 extra classes with $89 million means that each class cost an extra $4.5 million. The Comptroller also found that DOE had sharply cut the total number of classes in these grades by almost 900 over the last four years.
If the city had actually formed the additional classes that they claimed, class sizes in grades K-3 would now average 19.1 students per class. Instead, 65% of our K-3 children remain in classes 21 or larger, with 26% of them in classes or 25 students or more.
The Comptroller concluded that the DOE was improperly charging the state for teachers who should have been paid for by the city, counter to the intent of the law, and “inconsistent with the Program’s maintenance of effort requirement.”
Though the audit’s findings were essentially finished in July of 2005, the State Comptroller’s office could not release them until they had held a follow-up meeting with Department of Education officials, and allowed THEM to prepare a formal written response.
DOE asked for and received several extensions for this purpose. The formal written response from Kathleen Grimm, Deputy Chancellor of Finance and Administration, is dated Monday Nov. 7, 2005, the day before the Mayoral elections. In it, she essentially refuses to do anything differently in the future, essentially thumbing her nose at the State Comptroller and the law itself.
She also disputes the Comptroller’s methodology and conclusions, calling them overly “quantitative,” and says that she will not alter the department’s oversight or practices. Instead, she writes, DOE allows for “the holistic judgments of local educational leaders.” (It is interesting that on matters relating to bulletin boards and how children are arranged on rugs, Tweed is happy to prescribe to principals and teachers; but when it comes to matters such as reducing class size, they say they will leave it entirely up to them – even when it comes to the possible violation of state law.)
While the audit found there were schools with little room to form additional classes, it also found that there were many that did indeed have the room, but either were not receiving these funds, or were not using them appropriately. Moreover, the auditors found many instances in which schools were sitting only a few blocks away from each other, one overcrowded and with large class sizes, the other having plenty of room and with extremely small classes. And yet rather than adjust the catchment areas of neighboring schools in order to reduce class size more uniformly, Grimm responded that, “we do not believe any change to our approach to attendance zone boundary lines is necessary at this time.”
22 Comments:
1 paulrubin
· Apr 17, 2006 at 7:48 pm
Tell us something we don’t already know. NYC teachers aren’t looking to have something special. The rest of NY state, most, if not all of NJ, etc. keeps its class sizes at manageable levels. It’s probably the second most important thing (next to improving the general quality of teachers hired) that can be done to improve every aspect of a child’s education and yet the DOE gives it short shrift because it costs money and is an admission that all these other distractions are nothing more and teachers and parents actually know something.
2 phyllis c. murray
· Apr 18, 2006 at 3:18 am
When Class Size Matters
Our teachers are working tirelessly to educate their students. However, with the daily increases in the class-size, it is becoming more and more difficult to meet the incalculable needs of all children in our Hunts Point school.
As you know, the early years of instruction provide the foundation for the child’s years ahead. With over 28 students in Kindergarten classrooms and 38 children in a sixth grade, it is becomes increasing difficult to implement all aspects of a multifaceted curriculum. However, since our teachers are gifted, talented, resourceful, resilient and committed to educating their students, remarkable strides are made, daily. Despite the burgeoning class size, our teachers have s managed to provide the best education possible for all of our students. In fact, on May 5, 2006, our school will receive the Business Council’s of New York State, Inc. Pathfinder’s Award. We are one of the twelve schools in the state that will receive the highest honor given to schools by New York State’s private sector.
Our contract provides the following safeguards re. class size: “In the event that it is necessary to assign a teacher to a class which exceeds the maximum size listed above, the principal shall stipulate the reason in writing to the teacher and to the Chancellor. Such statement of reasons may be available for examination by the Union in the Office of the Chancellor.
1. The size of kindergarten classes shall be determined on the basis of a maximum of 25 pupils for each teacher, except as specified in 3 below.
2. Elementary, Junior High, and High Schools a. No subject class in elementary school shall exceed 32 pupils, except as specified in 3 below.”
However, after two consecutive years of battling the class sizes violations within our school in arbitration hearings, we find we must wait another year to get some kind of equity. It was made clear to me that it was the DOE’s position that they were entitled to rely on the exceptions to the class size limits that are contained in Article 7M2 for the 2005-06 school year. The arbitrator was relying on precedent decisions in previous class size grievances that give the DOE the right to rely on the exceptions for a two year period.
As we wait, we have found that the class size tips the scale again and again whenever more students are pushed in for a day or two. For example: Classes are broken up due to a teacher’s absence; an in-house suspension; and/or a field trip each which leaves a child behind.
Class Size Matters. As teachers we must mobilize around the issue of class size with our leaders. And while we are waiting,we must Grieve! Grieve! And Grieve some more! Perhaps our voices will be heard before the bell tolls.
Phyllis C. Murray
Chapter Leader
Bronx
3 paulrubin
· Apr 18, 2006 at 11:06 am
What’s sad is there shouldn’t be a tgrievance for this class size stuff. While it’s true, in general larger classes are tougher on teachers than smaller classes, most of us simply compensate. We’ll give fewer assignments or assignments that require less time to grade so as aleady further wreck our personal lives. Ultimately it’s only the students that suffer so if the DOE and Bloomberg and Klein are about doing right by the kids, they should be the ones FORCING individual schools to adhere to the smallest class sizes possible across the board. I’ve had classes of 44 and classes of 16 in my quarter century career. It’s possible to handle both. It’s not possible for students to maximize their potential though when they get little individualized attention on written assignments or during classwork. Again, there are some fundamental issues where the DOE and politicians are missing the boat:
1. Class size and the experience and ability of the teachers in the classrooms are the most critical factors to student success.
2. NYC is one of the highest cost of living areas in the country. NYC’s teachers, if paid among the higheset salaries in the country would only make them compensated in an average manner. The fact that NYC teachers are not properly compensated aggravates an already difficult situation in terms of recruitment and retention which impacts #1
3. No system where the parties are at war, especially a system where the management is only there for a short period of time while the workers are there for typically decades, can function in a positive manner unless both sides work together constructively. The city needs to listen to the teachers and learn from their successes and failures and there are plenty of both to review. The teachers need to deal with some of the realities of financial constraints, and recognize the existing system doesn’t work and be constructive in their suggestions. I think the UFT has tried to do some of that. It’s clear that the city and DOE have done none of that, if anything, they’ve done precisely the opposite.
Class size is a pretty good place to experiment. Some subjects could be taught in large group instruction areas. For example, there are definitely some lessons I could present to 100-150 kids with the proper technology and seating plan in exchange for smaller groupings of kids other times of the week when a more hands on approach would be necessary. I remember my college days well with lectures to 100-200 kids at a ahot followed by small group lab periods where there were like 8-12 of us directly interacting with the faculty. Everything in NYC is simply too lock step. There are kids who could handle larger groupings because they have the correct internal compass. Other kids need hand holding. Why can’t a way be found to compromise?
4 nycparent
· Apr 21, 2006 at 11:36 am
I have a general question about class size that I am hoping someone can help clarify. If there is a push-in teacher or pull-out teacher that supports smaller groups within a classroom does this count towards smaller classes. For example, in our school, we chose to have specialists which can concentrate on 5 -8 kids at a time that either need extra help or need more advanced work in lieu of smaller overall classes. It appears to be working very well. Do class size numbers include these?
5 KDeRosa
· Apr 21, 2006 at 10:55 pm
One of the few educational issues about which there is no dispute is that the size of classes has a direct and measurable impact on the prospects of student’s success in the classroom.
Let’s not let those inconvient things like facts get in the way of the agenda.
From The Evidence of Class Size:
While calls to reduce class size in school have considerable popular appeal, the related discussion of the scientific evidence has been limited and highly selective. The evidence about improvements in student achievement that can be attributed to smaller classes turns out to be meager and unconvincing. In the aggregate, pupil-teacher ratios have fallen dramatically for decades, but student performance has not improved. Explanations for these aggregate trends, including more poorly prepared students and the influence of special education, are insufficient to rationalize the overall patterns. International comparisons fail to show any significant improvements for having smaller pupil-teacher ratios. Detailed econometric evidence about the determinants of student performance confirms the general lack of any achievement results from smaller classes. Finally, widely cited experimental evidence actually offers little support for general reductions in class size. In sum, while policies to reduce class size may enjoy popular political appeal, such policies are very expensive and, according to the evidence, quite ineffective.
Of course, class size reduction probably would be more effective if the classroom instruction was better. But, as long as instruction remains at today’s miserable levels, class size reduction is a fool’s game.
6 Chaz
· Apr 22, 2006 at 11:09 am
nycparent;
Let’s see your school has the funding (that’s money) to have teachers whom work with groups of 5 to 8 students for extra or more intensive academics and you want to know if that is included in the class size? No!!!!! Push-in or Push-out programs are extras in addition to the classroom.
I assume that you agree that class size does matter since you stated it seems to help the students. Further, this program shows that if the money is allocated to the classroom and not to administration that it will help student achievement.
I’m glad to see as you get more involved in your child’s school, that the issues that are important to the classroom teacher is important to you as well.
Remember, we both want to see the student succeed both academically and developmentally.
7 jd2718
· Apr 22, 2006 at 11:50 am
derosa,
you really want to quote this guy at us? Your author 1) is a fellow at quite a nasty outfit and 2) has spent over 30 years looking for what makes a difference in student performance, and hasn’t found anything. (except that first-borns and kids from smaller families do better academically. sounds iffy)
Why don’t you pick up STAR and read, rather than rely on dubiously credentialled hacks? It says a bit less than those who cite it, but a hell of a lot more than what this guy claims.
nasty outfit
8 paulrubin
· Apr 22, 2006 at 12:31 pm
If class size is meaningless, why not increase it? Why not propose a deal to the teachers that gives them 50% increase in salary for a 50% increase in class size and reduce the number of teachers? I’d jump at the chance to have 48 in a class vs. 32 for a maximum salary of $135,000 instead of $90,000. Where can I sign up? But I’d be doing it for selfish reasons I assure you because you can be 100% assured the children involved would have a lesser education.
The reality of the situation is that class size is neither a panacea nor is it meaningless. There’s probably a different optimum class size for different kinds of kids that combines the best efficiency with the least negative impacts. But the other reality is that NYC is at the high end of the class size spectrum in this region so any complaints have to take that into consideration.
9 KDeRosa
· Apr 22, 2006 at 7:51 pm
jd2718,
The gains in performance indicated by the STAR Project were relatively small (less than 0.2 standard deviations of test performance in reading and maths) and that the gains were largely obtained from the first year of being in a small class. Remember, that gains less than .25 standard deviation is not considered to be educational significant.
Plus, the STAR project had serious methodological flaws. And, the results obtained in the study have never been able to be replicated since.
Reducing class across the board is hardly a panacea.
paulrubin,
If class size is meaningless, why not increase it?
Who said reducing class size was meaningless? This is a strawman.
As you point out, lower performers may benefit more from a reduced class size than higher-performers. I agree, with the proviso that any potential benefit is largely contigent on the quality of the classroom instruction.
Bad instruction is very tolerant of increased class size. When little learning is going on in the first place, you might be able to increase the size quite a bit before student performance suffers. Certainly, the constructivist/whole language nonsense Klein’s “experts” have foisted on the district qualifies as a bad instructional program. You can lower the class size down to ten and you’d be hard pressed to raise student performance with that curriculum.
10 phyllis c. murray
· Apr 22, 2006 at 9:42 pm
Why Class Size Matters
A teacher has more to do than just teach the students in his/her classroom. Now let’s begin: When we try to transform the classroom into a community of learners, the first challenge is to know each student. What is the child’s learning style, cultural needs? Are there physical challenges? Who is the child’s caregiver? How does the community impact on the child? Is there an individual education plan, a prior history of violence, a guidance record, a portfolio? In addition to answering these questions, one must keep an anecdotal record on students who are showing behaviors which deviate from the norm; arrange meetings with parents, guidance counselors, social workers, assistant principals etc. Then, one has to contact the parents as well as provide individualized instruction for students with special needs; monitor the work of visiting students; prepare for field trips and special projects/programs All of this takes time.
Although many teachers with years of experience can navigate this system, it should be obvious that being an effective
teacher takes time. It takes more than 6 hours and 37.5 minutes for most teachers to strategically plan a curriculum map and implement a viable program. And the more students you have, the more time one needs to invest in transforming the classroom into a community of learners. There is a reason our Contract has placed a cap on class size. Let’s say it’s elementary!
Phyllis C. Murray
11 jd2718
· Apr 22, 2006 at 10:34 pm
“The gains in performance indicated by the STAR blah blah blah blah blah methodological flaws. And, the results obtained in the study have never been able to be replicated since.”
Read it first.
12 Persam1197
· Apr 23, 2006 at 7:39 am
I don’t need to read report after report to state the obvious. Anyone who has spent ten minutes in a classroom knows that class size matters greatly. Did you learn more in oversized lecture halls or in small seminar classes with a dozen at the table? If large classes are antithetical to profound learning at our level, what makes anyone believe that packing in children with various needs is going to be effective?
Smaller classes means that we can realistically give more writing assignments and provide one-on-one instruction. Group learning is fine, however, it’s not a substitute for receiving individual time with a master in the discipline.
For me, teaching is about developing relationships. If I can give my kids more attention, I’m going to get better results. It doesn’t mean that I’m going to magically transform a level one 12th grader into a scholar, but it does mean I can give him/her what he/she needs to move to the next level with the time we have together.
Show me private prep schools or suburban schools that have overcrowded classrooms and parents willing to pay high tuition and/or school taxes and I’ll reconsider my position.
13 KDeRosa
· Apr 23, 2006 at 7:41 am
Read it first.
Are you stuck on stupid or can’t you think of a real response to to my critiques?
14 paulrubin
· Apr 23, 2006 at 8:58 am
This is the height of insanity. Bad instruction is bad instruction. It multiplies exponentially in a large classroom for two reasons. One is obvious. You’re exposing more kids to that bad instruction without anything to compensate. But the other would only be obvious to a teacher. Classroom management problems are typically the hallmark of bad instruction and a larger class by its very nature requires tight classroom management or it spirals out of control.
So basically you present this nonsensical position but refuse to respond to what I said. #1, if class size isn’t that important, why not increase it and save money (and reduce the number of weak teachers if handled properly). And #2, if class size reductions would be beneficial to certain groups of students not necessarily classified as special ed, why isn’t the all caring, all knowing NYC DOE striving to achieve that instead of playing games with curriculums and bulletin boards and high cost items like extended school days for subsets of the population.
This is still an absurd argument though. Class size needs to be flexible. Optimally it should consist of a combination of large group lecture and small group instruction to get the best of all worlds. So in a typical middle school math teacher’s program, there should be a period where all the teacher’s classes meet simultaneously in a small auditorium like classroom, preferably with ready access to technology like SmartBoards and the specialized software. The four periods saved from doing that twice a week lets you reduce class size for the small group instruction periods by close to 40%.
It’s time to think outside the box but one thing is an absolute. The teachers in the trenches need to be consulted and their opinions need to be heeded because they’re the ones who will do the implementation.
15 KDeRosa
· Apr 23, 2006 at 8:31 pm
Persam1197,
If large classes are antithetical to profound learning at our level, what makes anyone believe that packing in children with various needs is going to be effective?
Trying to teach any size class full of students with various needs is pretty stupid in the first place.
Show me private prep schools or suburban schools that have overcrowded classrooms and parents willing to pay high tuition and/or school taxes and I’ll reconsider my position.
The one good thing about NCLB is that we now have disaggregated data for lower performing minority groups and low SES students. And wouldn’t you know it, once you compensate for SES, these subgroups don’t do much better in the affluent schools with small classes and lots of money.
That’s because what gets taught in the suburbs is just as bad as it is in the city. The differences are superficial.
If I can give my kids more attention, I’m going to get better results.
This is what every teacher says. Classroom sizes have plummeted around the country in the last 30 years while funding has more than doubled in constant dollars. Student achievement remains stagnant during this same period across the board. Explain.
Apparently, it’s not quite as simple as you make it out to be.
16 KDeRosa
· Apr 23, 2006 at 9:09 pm
paulrubin,
Bad instruction is bad instruction.
And bad instruction is what you have in NYC with only 1/3 of students at levels 3 and 4. Whatever is going on in the schools it isn’t working for 2/3 of kids.
It multiplies exponentially in a large classroom for two reasons.
Ok, so let’s pretend we can get the same effect size (.25 SD) that STAR got. We’ll cut class sizes down to 13-17. In your typical inner city school peforming at the 20th percentile, we’ll boost performance to the 28th percentile with a .25 SD increase. Now insteads of 80 students not making the grade, only 72 won’t under the paulrubin plan. It’s time to celebrate. Where should we erect the statue in your honor, assuming the city has any money left now that we have to pay for twice the number of teachers?
#1, if class size isn’t that important, why not increase it and save money
Seems to work OK in the asian countries so maybe you have a point.
if class size reductions would be beneficial to certain groups of students not necessarily classified as special ed, why isn’t the all caring, all knowing NYC DOE striving to achieve that instead of playing games with curriculums and bulletin boards and high cost items like extended school days for subsets of the population.
One, possibility is that they don’t know what they’re doing. Two, because the expected effect size is small and speculative and the expense would be enormous. That’s lose-lose.
Class size needs to be flexible. Optimally it should consist of a combination of large group lecture and small group instruction to get the best of all worlds.
Maybe this’ll work, maybe it won’t. Surely you have evidence to back up your contention since you speak with such authority. Show me the inner city school where this plan works and it’s test scores. Talk is cheap.
The teachers in the trenches need to be consulted and their opinions need to be heeded because they’re the ones who will do the implementation.
Yeah, I’d like to round up all the teachers who work in a typical inner city school who’ve managed to get their student performance up to the 50th percentile and see what they say. there’s probably 5 in the whole city.
We don’t need to hear from the rest.
17 jd2718
· Apr 24, 2006 at 4:58 pm
“Are you stuck on stupid … ”
This is embarassing. You are attacking work you haven’t read. That may go over fine in dinner conversation, unless someone in the room has read the stuff.
I’ve read it.
” … or can’t you think of a real response to to my critiques?”
The critiques do not appear to be yours.
18 KDeRosa
· Apr 24, 2006 at 5:13 pm
jd2718 –
I’ve read it.
You may have read it, but you clearly haven’t understood what you’ve read.
I HAVE read the study and it does not say what you think it says. I’ve also read many articles both pro and con on the STAR findings. I’ve also seen no one since the project concluded succesfully get the same results, minimal though they were, that they did in STAR.
Again, you’ve failed to answer the issues I’ve raised. Sounds like you’re a teacher (though clearly not a teacher of statistics or the scientific method), why don’t you try to teach me what your position is instead of relying on cheap shots.
Why don’t you tell us what you think STAR supposedly stands for?
19 paulrubin
· Apr 24, 2006 at 7:46 pm
Out of 100,000 teachers in NYC KDeRosa, you believe there are 5 whose opinions are worthy of consultation. That pretty much says it all. Yet your opinion should be considered meaningful. That’s the height of arrogance, and its arrogance that has us in this mess to begin with.
Here’s what I do know. When I was a NYC student, class size was typically in the 30-34 range in middle and high school, a bit lower in elementary school, not all that different than what it is now. My oldest was in class sizes in the mid 20′s years ago in the burbs. That hasn’t changed much either. To say class size has plummeted is a nice sound bite but I’ve seen no evidence of plummeting class size over the past 30 years. Somewhat less? Perhaps. Plummet? Come on
There’s also no evidence that teachers are being paid drastically larger amounts of money in the NYC school system. Even if we were count the raises of the last two contracts as real raises (they weren’t when you factor in the longer day) the average teacher salary in NYC has not kept pace with inflation over the past 30 years. Like everything else pretty much, things go up in price, but I hardly see where my current salary covers the increases in housing, gas, tolls, insurance, etc. in the region. That’s not to say private industry has it any better. But NYC would have to jump teacher salaries another $10-$15,000 a year to noticably make a difference that would attract a larger number of applicants with superior teaching credentials. And that’s optimistic.
Finally, your SES stats lead me to only one conclusion and it’s not one I’m prepared to make. That is that children from low income families are going to perform poorly no matter what resources are thrown at them. So why waste the money. That’s an attitude I can’t accept. I’m realistic. NYC students are operating at a deficiency in terms of family consistency, primary language learned at home, and parental involvement in the classroom. But just because we might not achieve substantial test score increases doesn’t mean we should opt not to “waste” money on them.
I still believe class size isn’t a panacea but rather one weapon in a school system’s arsenal to manipulate student performance. I still think that any system that doesn’t have as its fundamental goal, a higher percentage of teacher candidates coming from stronger backgrounds and retained for a long enough period of time to become useful, is a system destined to fail.
20 jd2718
· Apr 24, 2006 at 10:58 pm
“I’ve also seen no one since the project concluded succesfully get the same results, minimal though they were, that they did in STAR.”
No one else has conducted a study of that magnitude or duration. STAR may be the only ed study with a large enough sample and a strong enough design to get results that show above the noise.
And minimal? There were significant gains in, if memory serves me right, grades 1 – 3, that persisted, measurably, all the way through 12th grade.
Anyway, that’s enough. I am tired of reading here what I could read at the Hoover Institute’s site, but choose not to.
21 KDeRosa
· Apr 24, 2006 at 11:59 pm
No one else has conducted a study of that magnitude or duration.
And what about in real life? Subsequent to STAR many districts, at great expense, rushed to reduce class size. Where’s the predicted stellar results?
And minimal? There were significant gains
Effect sizes were less than a quarter standard deviation (in most cases much less) which is not educationally significant. Such a small effect would only boost a 20th percentile school all the way up to the 28th percentile. Break out the champagne!
if memory serves me right, grades 1 – 3, that persisted, measurably, all the way through 12th grade.
Which proves my point.
The gains, such that they were, took place mostly in K, not in grades 1-3. Then the kids were dumped back into regular sized classroom in grade 4.
At best, STAR tells us to reduce class size in K and then only for the low-SES group since the other groups’ effect sizes were miniscule. Apparently, keeping existing class sizes in classes thereafter seems to be acceptable to hold onto those gains. At least there is no evidence yet to suggest otherwise yet.
This doesn’t seem to be the outcome you were suggesting.
22 nycparent
· Apr 25, 2006 at 10:19 pm
Chaz, just getting back from vacation. I ask the class size question because as an slt we agreed with our admin to try to keep class sizes higher but use well-qualified teaching resources for push in/pull out. It is working marvelously and is much more creative than splitting classes. Administrators should be able to decide and allocate. Also, I have never been less involved in school as this year because we finally have a good principal. I have the luxury of just sending them to school, getting homework done, and cookie baking again. Regarding the rest of the thread, the class size argument is ridiculously simplistic. I think Ms. Haimsen does an injustice to all parents by pursuing this naive, miopic platform.