THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, February 8, 1997 TAG: 9702080350
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MATTHEW BOWERS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: 112 lines
Extra-large isn't a size that fits when it comes to educating children.
Public school officials are completing homework assigned by the City Council: calculating with architects the costs of building elementary schools in each of three sizes, to house 670, 850 and 1,000 students.
Bad idea, education experts say. Too big.
Most recent research concludes that students generally perform better in smaller schools: elementary-school enrollments from 200 or less and ranging up to 500; 400 to 900 for middle schools; 400 to about 1,600 for high schools.
The feeling of ``community'' seen as a crucial link to successful student performance shrinks as schools grow, researchers say. Elementary students get overwhelmed. High school students blend anonymously into the crowd, making fewer attachments to teachers, other students or school activities.
``Their feeling is, if the kids don't get known, don't get noticed, they'll float through'' and not do as well, said Barbara Slater Stern, assistant professor of teacher education at Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Lynchburg. She's familiar with the research, and taught high school for 15 years.
``Size is related to getting everyone involved. . . . The busier kids are, generally the better gradesare.''
``In a large school, it's easy to get lost,'' agreed Edward W. Holler, principal of Yorktown Middle School and an adjunct education professor at Christopher Newport University in Newport News. His doctoral dissertation was on the effect of school size on high-schoolers, but it touched on middle and elementary schools as well.
``In a small school,'' Holler said, ``teachers know the kids better. Kids know the other kids better.''
Suffolk's 10 elementary schools average 536 students, although the largest, Nansemond Parkway, was housing 823 in the fall using a field full of mobile classrooms. The three middle schools average 791 students, the two high schools, 1,511 each. Most were built for smaller enrollments.
At a Jan. 15 workshop, City Council members asked school officials why they were seeking to construct several elementary schools to house 500 to 600 children, rather than fewer but larger schools of up to 1,000 students each, which might save money on land and central facilities, such as libraries and cafeterias.
Some council members also questioned why the city's two 1,500-student high schools couldn't be expanded on their existing sites, instead of building a third high school by September 2000 as proposed.
The school people cited the research and educators' warnings that student achievement suffers when schools get too big. The council, in turn, expressed serious concern about an unavoidable and sure-to-be unpopular jump in the city's property-tax rate if it has to pay for five new schools in the next four years, as requested in the school division's $128 million building plan.
The proposed new schools are a response to an enrollment surge in Suffolk these past two years of almost 1,200 students, or 12.3 percent, to more than 10,800. More of the same growth is expected this coming year for a 15-school system already forced to use 91 mobile classrooms.
The two bodies will meet again this month to discuss the new construction figures for larger schools. Their dilemma is shared by many school districts across the country dealing with crowded buildings and tight budgets.
Many districts are calling the National Association of Elementary School Principals in Alexandria for advice, said June Million, director of public information. A recent survey of member principals concluded that ``smaller is better,'' Million said. But definitive numbers for the best size for schools are hard to come by, and some members operate successful elementary schools with more than 1,000 students. It depends, Million said, on how they're managed.
For a time in the 1950s and 1960s, larger high schools - 4,000 students or more, say - were considered advantageous. The thinking went that they could offer more courses, sponsor more clubs, generally give students more chances to get involved.
And they did all that. But most - though not all - research showed that smaller schools generally enjoyed higher student achievement, better attendance rates, lower dropout rates, more participation in activities, more taking of leadership roles and more parent involvement. The smaller schools also had less negative behavior such as cheating, vandalism, theft, substance abuse and gang participation.
The better student attitude was credited to a more personal or ``community'' feeling that fostered a sense of ``belonging.'' Teachers know the students and each other better, so they can discuss how the kids are doing. The students see their friends more often during the day.
``Most good elementary principals know the name of every child in their school,'' said Henry E. York, dean of the School of Education and Human Services at Marymount University in Arlington, and a middle school principal for 20 years in Fairfax.
``Every child should be known well by a number of people in the school,'' York said. ``A lot of the basis for success is that a child's efforts are recognized.''
Still, size can be relative. Schools with a lot of underprivileged students benefit more than others by being smaller, while an elementary school of up to 800 students can work fine where few students are underprivileged, one California study concluded.
But a 1,000-student elementary school ``would probably not be a successful school,'' Randolph-Macon's Stern said. ``Because the little kids would be overwhelmed.''
Larger schools also can work when they're managed differently, researchers have found. Some of the drawbacks to big schools can be countered by creating smaller schools-within-schools, each with its own sense of identity or ``community.''
William S. Bradley, assistant director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for Educational Design at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, calls it dividing schools into discrete ``houses'' that occupy separate parts of a building and share common spaces, such as auditoriums.
Virginia in recent years has worked with local school districts to reduce class size, particularly in the lower grades, a move universally seen as key to improving academic success. Smaller classes mean more of them which, in turn, adds to the school-space crunch and the struggle between available tax dollars and the best schooling.
Suffolk's leaders are learning this only too well.
``As equally important as the number of children in the classroom,'' Marymount's York said, ``is the number of students in a school.''
KEYWORDS: SUFFOLK SCHOOLS SCHOOL SIZE