As school starts today in the Shoreline School District, elementary school parents may remember the rocky start school got off to last year.
This fall, thanks to a temporary agreement between officials and teachers, class sizes are more even and more split classes were planned further in advance. Moving any student to a new classroom should happen no later than the second week of school, district officials said.
Last year, uproar ensued when several elementary students were moved to new classrooms three weeks into the school year. The result was uneven class sizes in several cases, with extra-large classes getting some extra teacher help. Split classes also were created three weeks into the year, leaving teachers unprepared to teach two grade levels.
Many parents were upset and the Shoreline Education Association – the teacher’s union – held a one-day strike. In response, district officials said they were reacting to the problem of overloaded classrooms and saving money with a new way to support overload.
This fall, as part of an agreement between the district and the union, teachers get a bigger say in the process.
“I think the agreement we reached has a lot of potential in terms of increasing flexibility for teachers,” said Elizabeth Beck, co-president of the Shoreline Education Association – the teacher’s union. “Hopefully it will be beneficial for students in the classroom to be able to have balanced class sizes.”
This fall, class sizes are looking a lot more even than in past years, though officials don’t count students until the fourth day of school, said Marcia Harris, deputy superintendent.
Last year, officials created some extra-large classes and provided a teacher to help in those classes for one-fifth of the week. Technically speaking, officials hired a .2 full time equivalent teacher, or .2 FTE, per overloaded class.
This year, groups of teachers got to decide how to divide the class sizes, and the extra help.
The change means more even class sizes, but it also means classroom teachers will share limited support teacher time between two or even three classes.
“We all are a little skeptical about how effective that’s going to be, but at the same time the fact that the classrooms will be balanced is pretty critical for our teachers,” Beck said. “We’ll see how it goes.”
She thinks more support should be provided for teachers in the overloaded classrooms.
Another positive change was that some of the support teachers were hired early enough that the teachers they will work with were able to do some planning over the summer together, another positive, Beck said.
Another change from last year: Officials agreed to communicate further in advance about the possibility of split classes, which combine students from different grades when there’s not enough students in each grade to make a whole class.
Last year, split classes were created a few weeks into the school year, leaving teachers no time to prepare a new curriculum for another grade level.
This year, several schools warned of possible splits or hired for them in the spring, allowing teachers to prepare, Beck said.
If it turns out the split is not needed, it’s much easier to cancel one than to ask a teacher to teach one at the last minute, she said.
As for the possibility of students being moved weeks into the school year, officials sent a letter to parents at the end of last school year saying there may be situations where students will be moved from one classroom to another.
“We’re going to try to have that completed by the second week of school – fairly early on,” Harris said. “It should occur much earlier than it did last year.”
The agreement between teachers and officials is for this year only. When bargaining happens this summer on a new contract, the process could be made more permanent or altered.
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