Class sizes in early grades now largest in 14 years

UPDATE: Please check out your school's class size data here and let me know at leonie at classsizematters.org if it is inaccurate; for many reasons, we do NOT believe the data is reliable, especially in HS.  

Class sizes in grades K-3 and grades 4-8 have increased for the fifth year in a row. In high school, they have increased sharply as well.

In Kindergarten, 1^st grade and 2^nd grade, class sizes are now the largest in 14 years, since 1998, when class size data first was reported by the Independent Budget Office.

In 3^rd grade, class sizes are the largest in the historical record – even larger than in 1998.

These are the grades where the research is crystal clear that class sizes make a significant difference in terms of student’s success in school and later in life.

Rigorous evidence shows that children who are in smaller classes in the early grades get higher test scores, better grades, fewer disciplinary referrals, and are more likely to  go to college and own their homes more than twenty years later.

Smaller classes in all grades have been shown to strengthen the development of “non-cognitive” skills, like persistence, motivation, and self-esteem, which are also closely linked to success in school and in life

Class sizes have increased sharply since 2007, when a state law passed requiring the city to be reducing class size in all grades.

Conclusion:  the city is cheating our children out of their basic rights.

For a full data analysis, including long term trends see here or below: Class Size Report 2012   Here is a research brief on the proven benefits of class size.

Class Size Report 2012

The testing obsession, and how it is destroying my Kindergarten child

This parent prefers to remain anonymous.  But so many of us parents share her concerns about how the DOE’s obsession with testing threatens to undermine our children’s confidence and spirit.

My 5 year old boy attends kindergarten in a high performing school in a high performing district, and it is destroying him. He's such a happy child and in some ways, wise beyond his years. Applying basic skills, concepts and scientific discoveries to everyday life is easy for him and he can dissect numbers and do calculations in his head without hesitation.

Yet he comes home from school saying he's "stupid", a "loser" and is in " big trouble" because he can't read. This beautiful little boy struggles blending sounds to read words. He knows the letter sounds but reading the words is beyond his grasp right now. Read him a story, a long one with complex characters, and he will answer any question you have and he will tell you how something in his life relates to the story. He's a smart little boy who thinks he is stupid because his classmates know he cannot read and they tell him so. And he knows the pressure is on - he'll tell you he's a level "C" or a beginning level "D" but must be at least a beginning level "E" before first grade...his teacher told him so!

Maybe there are no high-stakes tests in kindergarten but there are "TASKS". Students are asked to read a nonfiction book (about trees) and write a book about the book in 25 minutes. Their written book was supposed to consist of a number of pages, with a sentence or two on each page about a picture that they drew. For the math task, they had to write and draw all the ways to form a number (8:  4+4, 5+3, 6+2 etc). And there was an observer in the classroom to make sure the tasks were administered correctly!

This absolutely wonderful, innocent little boy is being abused. Every day, when I pick him up at school, I have to pick up the pieces and make him whole. At parent-teacher conferences, no one ever said to me that he's young, he'll catch up. (BTW he was 11 weeks premature). Instead, I was just told to read more with him.

I know it's important to read, write and do math, but there is plenty of time for all that. Meanwhile, there are so many other skills that he needs, and so much else to explore and experience. He should be finger painting, playing in centers and navigating his way around the playground. I refuse to push him at home - he will be playing dinosaur hunter, building Lego cities and going to the park with me. My little boy is a precious gift from God - the DOE will not break his spirit!

I have heard that the DOE is commissioning new standardized tests beginning in preK, and I fear the obsession with testing our youngest children is just getting worse. When will it stop?  And what can we do to protect our children from this sort of abuse?

Kindergarten cut-off dates and lifelong success

See this NY Times article which talks about how the increased academic pressure on Kindergarten students is leading many states to move their cut off dates earlier in the year. NYC public schools continue to have among the latest cut offs for Kindergarten, December 31, according to the allied chart.

New York City private school cut off dates are much earlier; and it is very common when a child is applying to a private school, especially boys, that they suggest that they reapply the next year for Kindergarten again.

Though the red-shirt issue is mentioned only in passing in the article, the research is clear that kids who are old for their age group are far more likely to excel.  The number of professional athletes is significantly linked to their month of birth.  

Here’s a good explanation of how this accumulated advantage works in sports. For example, see this article , which reveals how elite Canadian youth hockey teams are more likely to have players born early in the calendar year, a phenomenon also found among professional hockey players.  

This “accumulated advantage” over time was named the Matthew effect by sociologist Robert Merton, from the Biblical quotation in Matthew: “For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.”  The Matthew effect has also been shown in soccer, swimming, tennis, and major league baseball .   

Yet relative age advantage is not only seen in sports; but in many other areas as well.  A recent study reveals how the youngest children in their grades are more likely to be diagnosed as having ADHD and to be prescribed medications such as Ritalin than their older classmates:

“From his analysis, Elder found that the youngest kindergarten kids were 60 per cent more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD than the oldest in the same grade, and also, by the time those groups reached the fifth and eighth grades, the youngest were more than twice as likely to be on prescription stimulants. Elder estimated that overall in the US, the misdiagnosis rate is about 1 in 5, that is around 900,000 of the 4.5 million children currently diagnosed with ADHD have been misdiagnosed.”

Here’s another study that shows that younger students by grade are more likely to be diagnosed with psychiatric disorders.  At age 15, they also tend to have lower test scores, are more likely to have low esteem and commit suicide in their teens, and less likely to become CEO’s as adults.

These studies collectively reveal the life-long damaging effects of the way we arbitrarily group children by age – and put excessive pressures on them to succeed .  The damage has been obviously exacerbated by the high-stakes accountability systems being imposed in schools around the country.

Kindergarten wait list crisis: pictures are louder than words

Is this really pocket overcrowding, as the DOE still maintains?  With waiting lists at more than one fourth of the city's elementary schools?  Check out the maps below.

Just as the administration cuts the capital plan back by almost 50%.....see for yourself the evidence of the growing overcrowding crisis in our schools.  Though the DOE will say not all these children will be forced to attend schools outside their zone, many of them will; others will be consigned to class sizes of 25 or more; and other families will have moved out of the city because of the lack of space in their neighborhood schools. 

If you put your cursor over the school, its name will appear; if you click on it, you will see the number of children who were on the wait list as of that date.  You can also zoom in and out.

2009 Kindergarten Waitlist (as of July): 28 schools, 474 children

2010 Kindergarten waitlist (as of March): 99 schools, 2217 children

2011 Kindergarten waitlist (as of March): 155 schools, 3193 children

No Busing for Overflow Kindergarteners in Queens

See email exchange between Marge Kolb, head of the Presidents council in D24 in Queens, and Kathleen Grimm of DOE below.

To this day, DOE has refused to put the placement of G and T classes through any public process for community input, leading to flawed decision-making and the awful outcome described below, with parents having to spend hours transporting their Kindergarten children to schools miles away from their zoned schools – with no busing provided.

As Marge says, "DOE cannot pretend to be 'well-managed' and continue to perpetrate these kind of harms upon parents and children."

___

From: MKolbcorr@aol.com [mailto:MKolbcorr@aol.com]
Sent: Monday, October 18, 2010 10:48 AM
To: Klein Joel I.
Cc: Fighetti Gabriela; Sternberg Marc; dmytrocec24@yahoo.com ; Roseann Darche; nickcec24@aol.com ; Chan Madelene
Subject: No Busing for Overflow Kindergarteners?

Dear Chancellor Klein:

I recently called the District 24 office to inquire about the schools in our district with capped kindergartens (which I believe, currently number 6 or 7 schools). I was shocked to learn that busing has still NOT been arranged for 10-12 Kindergarten students from PS 12 in northern Woodside who were offered seats LAST MAY at PS 128 in Middle Village. I was told that one parent may be walking the 4.5 mile round trip to get her child to school each day (twice! in the morning and afternoon) and another parent may be close to losing her job because of the time involved in delivering and picking up her child from school . Parents were initially (and kindly) given metrocards by the PS 128 principal so they could make their way by public bus with their children, but he has since had to stop providing these due to the expense, so now parents are expected to pay their own way (and take two buses) to get their children to school each day. Please note that PS 12 has a free lunch rate of 74% and Limited English Proficiency of 34% - this is primarily an immigrant population being served.

At the September 28 D24 CEC meeting, Gabby Fighetti from the Portfolio division stated that she had just learned of this situation and would immediately take action. Now, weeks later I am told by the D24 office that these students will not be able to be offered busing. This is unacceptable!

I find it absolutely appalling that instead of offering PS 12 students seats at PS 229, which is the next school zone to the south, the DOE instead placed a brand-new 1^st grade G&T class at PS 229 which could have instead been placed at the new PS 330 (at IS 73) which opened this year with a Kindergarten G&T. The class at PS 229 draws most of its students from outside the school zone, and thus, had it not been opened, PS 229 might very well have been able to take the overflow from PS 12 (as it took overflow from PS 143 last year).

This is just another example of why the centralization of decisions such as this is detrimental to districts. The right hand at Central does not know what the left hand is doing. You have CEC and Presidents’ Council leadership who have years of experience in the district and a perfectly competent District Superintendent on the ground, yet were any of us consulted in advance about these issues? No!

I would like an immediate report as to what is being done to get transportation for the affected students. In the meantime I will alert the local elected officials to this situation.

Marge Kolb

President, D24 Presidents’ Council

___

From: Grimm Kathleen [mailto:KGrimm@schools.nyc.gov]
Sent: Monday, October 18, 2010 4:11 PM
To: MKolbcorr@aol.com
Cc: Fighetti Gabriela; Sternberg Marc; Chan Madelene; Shear Jeffrey; Goldstein Eric
Subject: FW: No Busing for Overflow Kindergarteners?

Marge,

I am sorry for any frustration here, but PS 12 is a school that does not have busing. Children who are eligible can continue to receive MetroCards, but we cannot provide them to parents. I wish that I could be more help here.

Kathleen

___

From: MKolbcorr@aol.com [mailto:MKolbcorr@aol.com]
Sent: Monday, October 18, 2010 5:01 PM
To: KGrimm@schools.nyc.gov
Cc: GFighetti@schools.nyc.gov; MSternberg@schools.nyc.gov; MChan2@schools.nyc.gov; JShear@schools.nyc.gov; EGoldstein@schools.nyc.gov; dmytrocec24@yahoo.com; rdarche@queensbp.org
Subject: Re: FW: No Busing for Overflow Kindergarteners?

Dear Ms. Grimm:

Your information is incorrect. PS 12 HAS busing, it is PS 128 that does not, and inasmuch as DOE has offered seats to overflow students from PS 12 to attend PS 128 (AS LONG AGO AS LAST MAY!!!) it is incumbent upon the DOE to provide transportation to those students.

How come your reply to me does not address the fact that PS 12 parents were led to believe that they would receive busing or that seats at PS 229 (much closer to PS 12 than PS 128 is) were not offered but were instead slotted for a NEW G&T 1st grade class which could just as easily have been located at the new PS 330 which was already getting a NEW G&T kindergarten class?

DOE cannot pretend to be "well-managed" and continue to perpetrate these kinds of harms upon parents and children.

I already have The Daily News interested in this story and the local City Councilmember, Jimmy Van Bramer has been apprised, so I expect a better answer from you.

Marge Kolb

President, D24 Presidents' Council

Denying NYC parents the most basic choice of all

The Carl Icahn charter school in the Bronx is the most popular school in the city – according to the Daily News, with only 3% of applicants able to get in. Its principal notes that "You cannot fail at Icahn Charter because I have a million programs there to help you."

Why? All classes at the school are capped at 18, according to its website and an article in the NY Sun. Classes run to 4 PM, with Saturday help for any child who needs it.

And yet this administration, which promotes charter schools at every opportunity, allowed class size to rise in our regular public schools in all grades this year but 4th – despite $150 million in state aid that was targeted specifically to reducing class size. More than 66,000 students-- or about one quarter of all NYC public school children in grades K-3 are now in classes of 25 or more– an increase of more than 11, 000 students compared to last year. There are nearly 14,000 students in grades 1-3 in classes over 28 – a 36% jump.

The size of Kindergarten classes increased so much that average class size is now as large as in 2002 – when the mayor was first elected. Next year will likely be worse – with hundreds of parents on waiting lists for their zoned neighborhood schools. See articles about waiting lists in Chelsea, Upper East side, and Greenwich village – even after increasing class size to 25 – the union contractual maximum -- in all these neighborhood schools.

The administration says it will provide 100,000 seats for charter school students by 2012 – though there are only 25,000 new seats in the entire proposed five year capital plan. This means that they are planning to take at least 75,000 seats from our already overcrowded regular public schools – with more closing of neighborhood schools to make way for charters, and higher class sizes for those kids sent elsewhere.

Charter school promoters like Eli Broad constantly say that charter schools are “laboratories for success that others can emulate within a public-school system. So I'm a very strong believer in mayoral control."

Not sure what the meaning of “laboratories for success” is when the Mayor and the Chancellor resolutely refuses to implement the same reforms that make charter schools successful in the regular public schools they control – even when state law demands it.

And I’m not sure what parental “choice” means, which the administration claims to support, when they are insistent on taking away the most basic choice of all from parents – to send their children to their zoned neighborhood public schools. Some might even see it as a right -- except for the people who run this city, who would rather see the dissolution of our public schools so that privatization can prevail.