Classroom Size... (UPDATED)

Are there parent volunteers? can you go in and volunteer? I know for last year when my ds was in K, i went in 1 day a week. It really helped the teacher that i could work with kids on extra stuff and she could just teach!

We can all thank the government for this. My son has 32 kids to 1 teacher in his class this year. I'm scared for him, but very nervous for the kids that could fall through the cracks.

My kids had no more than 20 in their classes with an assistant .But we also have a high sales tax that goes to the school system. And a property tax that also goes to the school system. We do have a good system here but we also pay out the nose for it.

EDIT: But you are still adding the costs that I mentioned, which are not small. If your state says that a Kindergarten class can have 30 students, then technically adding another classroom, teacher, supplies, materials, training, mentoring, etc is superflous. I'm not saying that it's the best thing to do, but setting up a first year teacher is EXPENSIVE and budgets are set long before the first day of school. Again, that money would need to come from somewhere!

Think about the math for a minute... 12 extra students doesn't financially justify another teacher. That person's salary and benefits have to come from somewhere! 20 extra students justifies another classroom. It's not just salary and benefits either... space, materials, supplies, etc. I wish it was that easy, but it's not. This is pretty common in most schools. On the other hand, if you have classrooms with 15 or 16 students, tax payers complain that it's a waste. Really- can't win either way.

I wish I could tell you that the private schools are less crowded, but in all reality most aren't. All I can suggest to you is that you volunteer and encourage other parents to do the same. Adding extra hands in the classroom in the most immediate way to change the situation.

There are a lot of reasons schools don't have funding - budget cuts, focusing on the wrong things (sidenote: I disagree that it is useless to have a special needs class, whether it be gifted or for severely disabled students), mismanagement. My kindergarten at a private school years ago was 24 students. When I was in 5th grade at a large public school, we had 34 in our reading class. It may not have been easy on the teacher but she made it work. While 27 is not ideal, is she able to make it work? Or is it chaos? That would be a big factor. Do they have parent helpers sometimes? Could you volunteer to be one and see how the class is run?

If you think the class size is an issue, then your choices are to request he go to a different school (you may have to transport him), pay for private or bring it up to the PTA and/or board, perhaps with other parents.

In our school, my experience from K-3 averages 21-24 kids per class. Teacher and O. year a TA for a child needing services. Two years for half the year they had student teachers.

It sounds like your elementary school is similar in size to ours. The good news is that it's a small school, the bad news is that limits their flexibility. We were told that the classroom size is basically dependent on how many kids register for kindergarten that year. At the open house a few weeks before school, class size was still in the 18-20 range. But all the last minute registrations are putting it closer to 24-25 in each class. I understand that some people had legitimate reasons for waiting, but it upsets me that those who were "still deciding" didn't bother to register while they were weighing their options (IMO it's common courtesy to at least llet the school know that there is a chance these kids could start kindergarten there). My thoughts are that it isn't ideal, but I know our kids will do fine in this situation. I know that our expectations have changed, but this is pretty consistent with class size when I was growing up (I did fine, as it sounds like most on this site did).

And since it seems that many of us are venting, I do want to add my frustrations...
- First is with the PA tax system and the "complainers". Way too many seniors complain to me about the high property taxes (much of which goes to the school system). Most, although I admit not all, of these folks have negligible medical expenses (gotta love Medicare), are still earning pensions and social security, and have beautiful homes. Their children are grown and out of the house, but they don't want to pay to educate our kids -- the ones who will feed the Medicare-social security beast that they've created! Ugh, give me a break...
- Secondly, I think that educators should be some of the higher paid professionals in our society since they create the most important "commodity" that our country needs. Yes, this includes the administrators. Unfortunately, a big part of their job is navigating the union mess (an ugly beast that exists because we don't pay teachers enough, IMO). These are highly educated public servants, most of whom are truly trying to do their best for our kids.

OK, end of soapbox lecture ;)

My kids had ( and still pretty close to as they are older now) 20,25, 26 (spilt into two classes) in their grade. Once they hit 4th or 5th grade did they start all being one class, in one room.

I was at the kindergarten parents meeting last night and they addressed this. We have 21 per class, and if we get to more than 23 per class, we split. They warned us of this because there are 4 total classrooms, so if 9 more kids enroll in kindergarten between now and the 1st day of school (next week), then our child's teacher could change because all the kids would be redistributed when they will hire another teacher and drop all the classes to 19 per room.

This is a public school, with full day kindergarten (which I was thrilled about). Oh, and there is 1 aide that assists all the K classes, which is fine since the class size is relatively small.

There are 22 children in my girls 4 and 5 year old class (it's PK and K combined). And there are three full time certified teachers, so the ratio is just over 1:7. It's a private school. Class size is one of the reasons why we chose private over public. Our local public school averages 28 kids per K class, with one teacher and sometimes an aide -- usually if there is a special needs child in the class who has a helper.

That was how many kids were technically in the class (26 or 27?). But there were never more than 20 kids in the class on any given day. Since half of k is spent being home sick. Okay, 1/4 of K to be more accurate (1 week a month on average, 2 weeks only sometimes). There were several weeks where only 10 or 11 kids were in class. Most of the time there were 15-18.

We had two schools close in our district, Now we have max 32 students per kindergarten class. Right now I think my daughter has 31 in her class. Our school added 185 extra students this year. It's an adjustment.

Kindergarten is the only class that has this large of a cap I think the cap for grades 1-5 are 25 or 26 or so.

I don't really think it is as big of a deal for kindergarteners.

In my public school district, we have a separate school dedicated entirely to kindergarten. All of the kindergarten kids for the entire district go here. It is an all-day program that the district has been doing now for 3 years. It has been very successful. There are 12 kindergarten teachers that have an average of 20-25 students per class.

My son was in kindergarten last year. I volunteered there 1 - 2 days per week all year. I got to see, first hand, how the school was run. The teachers are more than capable of handling that many students. And, the day is divided up into different activities that break up the day as well as two recesses and lunch. There were aids that bounced from class to class to help out. And, in my son's class, the parents help out just about everyday. I don't think you need to worry about this.

Thank the courts for this. They are rich enough to send their kids to private schools.

In some places 1/3 of the school budget is for bussing kids past one school to get to another. That money could be used to reduce class sizes. Then again I worked in a county school system. In a severly handicapped class I subbed in there were two "teachers". There were 8 kids in this "class". None of them could respond to their names, eat by them selves, or knew where they were. The teachers each made $70+ k per year. The teacher and I spent our time changing diapers and feeding them. They had special busses and two bus drivers for each of the two busses. It wouldn't surprise me that the school system spent $250k per year on these 8 "students". All we really did was babysit. And you wonder why class sizes are so big, and I didn't even address the $100+K salaries the principals and assistant principals get.

You already get the idea.

Good luck to you and yours.

My daughters class has 22 students and they have a teachers aide as well. I think I read in the handbook that if there are more than 20 students in a class that an aide is required, district policy. You may want to check with the schoolboard and see if there's anything like that in place. It does sound like a large ratio. Even when my son was in Kindergarten (years ago) there were a little over 20 students, the teacher, and an aide.

My son's Kinder class has 22 kids.
My daughter's class, upper grade, has 27 kids.
Public school.

Now: class size depends on:
- how many classrooms per grade level there are
- how many classrooms a school has for each grade level
- the size of the school
- their ability per budget, to construct new classrooms and buildings.
- the geographic location of the school and how many of its student population are "district exceptions" to the school or how many of the student population are in their home school district.
- the make-up of the geographic location of the school. ie: some neighborhoods/districts, simply have a LOT of families with kids... living in the area. Thus, they all go to that school.
- Schools, cannot decide, how many kids and families, live in their district. Thus, cannot decide, how many kids, are going to be incoming to the school/Kindergarten.
HENCE, class sizes, increases in certain years... because in any given year, there may be a LOT of grade school entering kids, that year.

My kids' school, has teacher assistants in the rooms. Especially for Kindergarten.

Schools, cannot always "predict" how many students there will be in any given year, because:
- they cannot know ahead of time, how many Kindergarten age entering kids, are in that neighborhood or district. NOR do they know and cannot predict... how many of those kids living in that neighborhood or district... are going to go to public or private, schools.

And, they cannot just hire extra Teachers. Budget. And, student population fluctuates, each year. They cannot predict that either.
But, teacher aides/Assistants are cheaper. And they often rotate... amongst various classrooms/grade levels.

Or, the school has to shuffle around its Teachers... to then fill another grade levels over-abundance of kids, per grade level. But that means, that Teachers have to teach another grade level which they normally do not teach, JUST in order, to have enough Teachers for a grade level that has an over-population of students, in its grade level.
So say a grade level usually has 4 classrooms. But a certain incoming grade level has a student enrollment which would fill 5 or 6 classrooms. The school and the Teachers, then have to shuffle around themselves, in order to provide 2 more teachers for that over-populated grade level. JUST for that 1 year. Then that other grade level in which the Teachers were taken from... has less Teachers. And more kids in class. It is a pain. For the Teachers and the school. But the parents don't think of that.
It is not always the school's... fault.

All day Kindergarten, is common. That is how it is for my son in Kinder. It is all day, everyday.

Some years and some neighborhoods, have a lot of families and kids living in the school's district.
Schools cannot control that. Nor how many kids there are living there.... and when a kid enters Kindergarten.
Some neighborhoods have a lot of families/kids living in it... because of the school that is in the district and it may be a favored, public school. Thus that school, becomes overburdened. In its population.

Hi,

The same thing happened to us. We didn't complain, because we were told that a teacher would be added for first grade. That didn't happen. We didn't complain. And yes, it happened again in second grade! They just kept moving the two classes up. So several families worked very hard to communicate with the superintendent and school committee that this was unacceptable. An additional teacher was hired for third grade! I am recommending that you speak up faster than we did. My best to you.

Only 2 classes? Consider yourself lucky.

As far as the kids per class, that's the norm in my area. They are doing their best with the money & resources provided to them. My DD's school added a 4th K teacher at the last minute because classes were at 30 kids each. Now, 3 weeks into school, DD's class has 28 kids, and this is WITH the 4th teacher in the mix.

My advice is to volunteer in the classroom, help out on campus, and get involved, if you want to make a difference. Complaining really does no good.

Enrollments in public schools have been up in our area. It has to do with the recession. People can't afford private schools, are

my daughter starts public k tomorrow, we did orientation yesterday i think there are 4 k classes and each one has 20 kids and 1 teacher. My brothers daughter is in catholic pre-k and has 20 to 1 teacher as well. IDK anything besides that though=) I'm sure if anything the teacher will suffer not your son, he'll probably love the extra kids

When my daughter was in private school there were 7 kids in her class. She currently has 24 kids in her kindergarten class. There is a teacher and a parapro though. I think 27 kids for one teacher is absurd for kindergarten. If you can afford to put him back in private...I would do that.

It's too bad, because 20 or so is an ideal class size.

However, schools can't help the budgets they are working with. Don't worry yet -- a good teacher can handle that many students. You might be surprised.

Relax and enjoy his first year of Kindergarten!

Krista P...nicely said. I'm glad I read through this time before responding. I am in total agreement. 12 extra students do not justify another teacher, when funding is being cut, we as communities are not approving levy, taxes and such.

Can't just expect them to whipped out salaries, supplies, desk, availablity of rooms if there is no money.

Plus the school has no control over how many students get added over the summer. So yes, they probably expected to have around the same amount of kids. People move and kids need to enroll, the district cannot control that.

Personally I think all day KG is excellent, last year my daughter loved it and learn so much more than I ever expected.

That's why we opted for the PM session for our son.

Two less kids in the afternoon!

I'm already fearing the coming years. The cuts are REALLY going to make a huge difference with their education!

A lot of times right before school starts there is a rush of people enrolling because they have moved into the area or changed their mind about the kids going to that particular school. The school could have honestly only had 40-50 kids enrolled then the week before classes started they suddenly had nearly 60.

In our kids school they had over 60 kids enrolled for Pre-K. They only have 2 teachers and 2 classrooms for them. They have a wing of the school that is connected to the little kids playground, the wing has 2 pre-K classrooms and 3 Kindergarten rooms. They put a 3rd Pre-K classroom together but it's in the basement. They have no other place for it. The teacher is usually a teacher for a much higher grade but they could put together some upper classes and move her...I don't think I would want our guy to be in that classroom, I'd rather he be in the regular classroom.

I do appreciate that they tried and made room for everyone but still, if they don't have room they have to do what they can.

This is why we sent our kids to a Montessori school (same class size, 1 teacher, 1 assistant, both well trained in a method that works). I am sad for your son, that is simply way too many kids that age for one teacher. If it is financially feasible, send him to the private school if this situation proves to be a problem for him. But give it a month, see how it goes, maybe he will like it!

That said, I went to Catholic schools and was always in a large class, with never more than 1 teacher per classroom. BUT. Private schools have the advantage of expelling students for any reason they deem fit, and so our classes rarely had the worst of the problems I have seen in the public schools. As a culture, we were well disciplined students who wanted to be there and wanted to learn. The public school system does little to foster an environment like this, and they are dealing with a larger, more varied population that includes the poorest of the poor and most needy among us. Some days I am amazed it has not come crashing down on itself.

And I have to agree with 8kidsdad about administrative costs. I am appalled at the amount of money that goes into keeping people on in lame administration jobs as if there is some kind of tenure at the public school level.

Lastly, it's ok to change your mind after you try something. Try not to stress out too much about it. You can always try out the public school for a month and then transfer him if it's not working out. And small classes or not, every school is different. A large class with one teacher may work great, but with another it may be a disaster.

Reminds me of when I was a kid back in the 70s. We had over 30 kids per class. We got along just fine with learning. We all knew to behave and follow rules and we learned quite well. I think the teacher will be fine and up to the task. You can ask about parent volunteers. Many kindergarten classes have that these days. And if it's something they don't have you can ask to help set something up. Parents would have to get security screenings to be approved to come in but that's the way it is since 9/11 at most schools. Some just ask for TB tests. Check with the teacher now, or the principal and see about teacher volunteers in the class.

My triplets were in kindergarten last year. The first school they were at there were just 16 kids in their AM class. We moved and were put in separate classes since it was the middle of the year. Each class had about the same amount. Both school (different parts of the state) were very big on teacher volunteers. Some parents came in nearly daily and others came in once in a while depending on schedule.

I've found that schools that hold 1/2 day kindergarten do not have a preschool program at the school. Those who have full day kindergarten usually have a 1/2 day preschool program at the school. My oldest son had 1/2 day kindergarten and no preschool at school the year before. My 16 year old had full day kindergarten because he went to the 1/2 day preschool the year before. My triplets had no preschool program so they had 1/2 day kinder. These were in 3 different states, lol! (we're recently retired military)

I think you need to let go and see how the teacher does and offer some parent volunteering. Keep in touch with the teacher and offer any help you can through out the year and ask how things are going. I'm sure with the larger class size there will be support from the administration. Talk to the other parents and suggest helping more with everyone to make things smoother. The teacher will appreciate any and all help all the parents can give! With these economic times the community is going to have to work teacher with the teachers and help as much as they can.

K. B
mom to 5 including triplets