Part #1
For several months Another View will focus on a single issue, one of huge importance to teachers and students, but one that receives little attention from policymakers, district leaders, and the media.
The issue: class size and teacher
workload. My newsletters will address various perspectives on this issue. We
will hear from teachers, parents, and students. We will look at the research (including
2021 Nobel Prize winners). If this introduction is at all persuasive, I hope a
number of readers will follow this series: each month a newsletter, a maximum
(I promise) of 5 pages. Perhaps an 8-minute read. Current plan: January:
what teachers say; February, the research; March, policy in place
- alas, in other states.
“Class size” is the term that often covers the topic. But one must add “teacher workload.” (See Addendum A.: Defining our terms.) This long-time middle and high school English teacher is stunned and disheartened to continue to hear of Colorado high schools where a class sizes of 34 – times FIVE CLASSES A DAY – means teachers are expected to meet the needs of 170 students. I consider this outrageous (“going beyond all standards of what is right and decent,” Webster’s[i]). We must address it. The elementary teacher with 34 students is overburdened, too. At all grade levels, this must change.
|
Colorado Pupil Teacher FTE Ratio[ii] 2018-19 – 17.3 2019-20 – 17.1 2020-21 – 16.6 |
National reports are
only slightly more accurate in capturing what class sizes look like in Colorado.
See Addendum B.
Are we
helpless? Will this series simply be a protest, without any solutions?
(All bold mine)
One teacher I met with spoke of the troubling
teacher-student ratios at her Denver high school: Three of her colleagues have 135,
148, and 155 students in their five classes. This teacher sounded confused and helpless
on this issue. Who has the power, she wondered, to bring these numbers down?
|
Covid
and Class Size Learning
loss. Disengaged students. Mental and emotional health. Of
course K-12 education has other priorities right now. But as we try to
“reimagine” the schools we want to see post-pandemic, I am glad to see leaders
recognize the connection, stressing smaller classes as a way forward.
Especially for those students who have lost so much. “How
COVID-19 may change the conversation about class size”[iv] “…
new federal relief funding may give school districts the opportunity to
fulfill long-desired aims to reduce the numbers of students in classes, a new review of state policies by the
National Council on Teacher Quality said. “Targeted class size policies, such as
those for core academic courses, high poverty schools or English learners,
may yield more support for students most impacted by pandemic hardships,
rather than system-wide class reductions, wrote Patricia Saenz-Armstrong, a
senior economist with NCTQ. “Pandemic-forced virtual learning, cohorting and social distancing will add another layer to the long-standing debate about how big classes should be and even whether to focus on class sizes, student-teacher ratios or another metric to ensure student needs are met.” (Bold mine) |
“I don’t know how we would make them
smaller if we could. Voters [would] need to approve if it is funding.
“To me, it’s not just a principal’s
responsibility.
“It’s not just a
parent’s responsibility.
“It’s not just the union’s
responsibility.
“Who can ever change this? It’s just lost in the bureaucracy.”
I am determined to make the case that we are not helpless. There are steps we can take—if we accept, as I believe, the large teacher workload in too many of our schools is wrong and must not continue. Ideas for state policy will appear later in this series. First, however, I need to answer the essential question: why should class size and teacher workload be a priority for Colorado?
How
this issue is of professional interest. And why it is personal.
From 1990-1996 a major reform effort
I followed here in Colorado, as a foundation program officer, sought
fundamental changes in how high schools were structured. The foundation
supported the Coalition of Essential Schools’ work in six Colorado high schools:
Horizon High School (Adams 12), Sky View (Mapleton), Pueblo County (Pueblo 70),
Fort Lupton High, Pagosa Springs High, and Roaring Fork High. One of the nine
principles of the Coalition of Essential Schools (CES), presumably a goal for
these six schools and approximately 1,000 others[v]
across the nation that joined the Coalition, asserted:
Personalization
Teaching and learning should be personalized to the maximum feasible extent. Efforts should be directed toward a goal that no teacher have direct responsibility for more than 80 students in the high school and middle school and no more than 20 in the elementary school.[vi]
Achieving that goal of 1:80 in these six schools proved hard or impossible. It is where I first became aware of the huge teacher workloads in a number of Colorado schools[vii]). Some good efforts were made. At Pagosa Springs High: “The average teaching load decreased from 125 students per teacher under the traditional schedule to 70 with blocks (1992-1993).”[viii] I visited a class at Horizon High where the veteran English teacher sent half of her 34 students to the library that day so she could have a strong seminar with the 17 remaining; she would reverse that the next day. A nifty strategy, but not a compromise any teacher should be forced to make.
My files on class size/teacher
workload go back to the mid-1990’s. I have added ever since; these files are
now bulging. Much of what you will see in Another View comes from
25-plus years of material. Will the articles, insights, and research I share be
dated? If the issue had gone away, perhaps. I fear it has merely been swept
under the rug.
For here we are in 2021, with
teachers telling us of their 170 students.
I do not believe any “silver bullet”
will transform public schools. However – call me crazy, say I am obsessed with
this one issue – I happen to think class size and the teacher workload is
related to:
·
Student achievement
·
Student social-emotional well-being
·
Student engagement
· School culture and climate
· The ability of students to develop strong relationships with teachers
· Teacher satisfaction
· Teacher retention/turnover
· Teacher shortage
· Parental support
· School improvement
I am convinced each
is affected by demanding too much of our teachers. As we do when the class size
and a teacher’s workload are too large.
|
COVID and Class Size “Districts look to hire more teachers,
cut class size to make up for what COVID-19 took”[ix] “…in the tiny Monte Vista School
District in southern Colorado, the focus will be on hiring teachers and reducing
class sizes for a better learning experience.” The Westminster
district will “hire 50 more teachers … ‘The smaller class sizes will
make it possible for teachers to help kids who are struggling and need more
assistance,’” said Sandra Nees, chief financial officer. “How DPS is spending $205M in funding”[x] "Denver’s Newlon Elementary School is using its share of federal coronavirus relief dollars to keep class sizes small and ensure students have access to mental health providers.” |
Deep
in my bones - my lived experience
I add a more
personal note to explain why I feel this issue deep in my bones, why I am so alarmed
by what I see regarding class size and teacher workload in many of our public
schools. These two factors played no small part of my own professional journey,
and why I have concluded they are critical for schools, teachers, and students to
succeed.
First teaching
job: middle school (6-9), four classes, none larger than 14. A total of
56 or so students. 8 advisees. Private school.
Second teaching job: high
school, five classes, average 22 each, 110 students. Many semesters doing
hall, library, or lunch room “duty” one “free period,” leaving me only one
planning period. Public school.
Third teaching job: high
school, four classes, none larger than 16.
A total of 60 or so students. 10 advisees. Private school.
Fourth and fifth jobs –
Colorado – K-8 schools. Four classes of 20-23 students. Less than 90
students. Public and parochial.
That second
teaching job, in a consolidated high school serving four communities in Vermont,
was extremely fulfilling, but I could not sustain it. Yes, I taught English (i.e.,
reading and writing – more on that in #241) and coached two varsity
sports as well, but I did that at my next high school, too, my third job. But at
that latter school, given the smaller classes and the total number of students
I was expected to know and serve well, I could manage. A number of faculty
members taught there for over three decades.
I have enormous respect for Colorado teachers who can meet with 170 students every day and, against the odds, do well by every one of them. Still, I trust we can agree that this is not “best practice.”
But that is insufficient. We place too great a burden on
teachers when we ask them to teach so many students. Everything in my teaching
life says that this is malpractice. It is unfair. It must change.
Addendum A: Defining our terms (Bold mine)
1. Pupil-Teacher Ratio is not the Average Class Size
From “NCPEA POLICY BRIEF - CLASS-SIZE POLICY: THE STAR EXPERIMENT AND RELATED CLASS-SIZE STUDIES,” by Charles Achilles, National Council of Professors of Educational Administration, Oct. 2012.*
Differing
Definitions that Affect Conclusions: Class Size vs. Pupil-Teacher Ratio
Since the early
1900s class-size studies in the United States and elsewhere have shown positive
benefits for students and teachers. Yet class size in the early grades is still
debated and is not a predominant national policy. The debate is fueled in
part by confusion over how students and teachers are counted.
[Achilles explains
there is a significant difference between Pupil-Teacher Ratio (PTR) and Class
Size.] “On average, the difference between these two calculations in American
elementary schools is about 10 students.”
Pupil Teacher Ratio (PTR) is “the
number of students in a school or district compared to the number of teaching
professionals.” Often all educators are part of the computation, including
counselors and administrators. PTR is a formula and process for equitable
allocation of resources important to administrators, policy persons, and
others.
Class Size is “the number of students
for whom a teacher is primarily responsible during a school year.” Class size
is an organizing tool for providing instructional and education services to
clients.
Average Class Size is the sum of all
students regularly in each teacher’s class divided by the actual number of
regular teachers in those specific classes. If four second grade classrooms
have 14, 16, 18, 18 (n=65) students, the average, (not actual) second grade
class size is 16.25 (or 16). *https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED540485.pdf
2. Average Class
Size does not reveal a Teacher’s Workload
From “Reducing Class Size: What Do We
Know,”
National Institute on Student Achievement, Curriculum and Assessment, U.S.
Department of Education, May 1998.*
“When is Reduction
Not a Reduction”
(Explains key difference between class size and a teacher’s workload.)
“Reducing
class size does not necessarily reduce the teacher’s workload, or even the
number of students they teach each day. If a teacher is assigned to teach more
classes because the number of students in each class is reduced, the teacher
spends more time teaching and has no fewer students… The common assumption is
that smaller classes allow teachers to increase the time devoted to each
student, either individually or in smaller groups, and thereby improve the
quality of the students’ education. If this assumption is true, successful
class size reduction programs will have to attend to the impact on teachers’
workloads."
*https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED420108.pdf
Addendum B – National Report - Colorado and U.S.
The National Center for Education Statistics, the gold standard for many on school data, lists the national “average class size” and the average for each state. This is from its most recent study, for 2017-18.*
|
|
Primary
Schools |
Middle
Schools |
High
Schools |
|||
|
|
Average class size for teachers in self-contained
classes |
Average class size for teachers in departmenta-lized
instruction |
Average class size for teachers in self-contained
classes |
Average class size for teachers in departmenta- lized
instruction |
Average class size for teachers in self-contained
classes |
Average class size for teachers in departmenta-lized
instruction |
|
United States |
20.9 |
26.2 |
16.6 |
24.9 |
16.3 |
23.3 |
|
Colorado |
22.8 |
23.1 |
21.0 |
25.8 |
18.4 |
24.3 |
|
Colorado
compared to national average |
+4.4 |
+.9 |
+2.1 |
+1.0 |
||
These figures are closer to the reality for schools and teachers in our state than CDE’s pupil-teacher numbers. If accurate, this would suggest middle and high school teachers in Colorado are not seeing classes much larger than is the national average. If they teach five classes a day, as part of an English, History, Science, or Math Department, they are “only” seeing about (5 x 25) 125 students.
Endnotes
[i] Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary.
[ii] FTE = Full time equivalent, http://www.cde.state.co.us/cdereval/staffcurrent.
[iii]
AV#214 - Two key factors
affecting recruitment, retention, and how teachers feel about the profession:
Time and Class Size. More important than the pay check?
A.
What the Colorado Department of
Education tells us on class size. (It doesn’t. Teacher-student ratio ≠ class
size.)
B.
What Denver Public Schools tells us on
average class size. (Nothing.)
C. The numbers our high schools tell us, celebrating their success. (But not a word on class size.)
D. A parent’s struggle to find the average class size of his/her child’s school.
[iv] K-12 Dive, by Kara Arundel, Oct. 18, 2021, https://www.k12dive.com/news/how-covid-19-may-change-the-conversation-about-class-sizes/608368/.
[vii] Baseline Report on Use of Nine Common Principles at Skyview High School, 1993. Colorado Department of Education. “A major source of concern among Skyview teachers is the school’s schedule which produces teaching loads of up to 150 students… At Skyview, teachers have six periods a day four days a week – and on one of those days, they must teach a seventh period. it is, in the words of one administrator, ‘a killer schedule’ as far as teachers are concerned. ‘People call it the schedule from hell,’ he said. ‘Four years ago, I had 125 kids, but this year, with the floating seventh period, I have 171 kids,’ one teacher said. ‘This schedule may be beneficial to kids in that they have more choices, but it’s not beneficial to them in terms of personalization.'"
[viii] From draft of evaluation of Re:Learning in Colorado, “Pagosa Springs Report, conducted by InSites, submitted to the Gates Family Foundation,” July 12, 1996, page 17.
[ix] “Can millions in federal money help Colorado schools address pandemic-fueled learning loss?,” by John Aguilar, The Denver Post, Aug. 21, 2021, https://www.denverpost.com/2021/08/21/coronavirus-learning-loss-schools-colorado-esser-federal-money/
[x] “How DPS is spending $205M,” by Melanie Asmar, Chalkbeat Colorado, https://www.pressreader.com/usa/daily-camera-boulder/20210825/282252373617071.
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