Does this happen where you live?

[joenali]

We have what is called the October 10 day attendance count in the state and it happens at all schools. In the district I work in the numbers of students are lower than projected so they displaced 25 teachers and consolidated classroom across the district. . At my school alone they cut a first grade class of 22 and placed the students amongst 4 other first grade classes raising the class size to 28 or 29. They've also let go of a full time instructional aid in the Sped department. It's been awful for everyone.

Parents and teachers are outraged across the district. How is it right that there are now 29 kids in a first grade class? How is it right that students who have legally binding aid time now don't have it? Does this kind of crap happen where you live?

[killercupcake]

We have count day in September about two weeks after school starts.

Nobody really got cut in our district though. We're already way understaffed. Unfortunately for us, 30 kids in a class isn't all that unusual here and is actually on the low side, especially in high school. Some counselors were surplussed, but they were moved to other schools.

[joenali]

Oct 10, 2015 11:03:26 GMT -5 killercupcake said:

We have count day in September about two weeks after school starts.

Nobody really got cut in our district though. We're already way understaffed. Unfortunately for us, 30 kids in a class isn't all that unusual here and is actually on the low side, especially in high school. Some counselors were surplussed, but they were moved to other schools.

High schools usually have 30-35. But we are talking first grade!

[sonrisa]

So what happens? They look at which kids show up those 10 days? If a kid doesn't show up during those days, they aren't considered a student? And if so, how can they have counted 10 days in October since there have only been 7 school days? This puzzles me.

[killercupcake]

Oct 10, 2015 11:05:14 GMT -5 joenali said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:03:26 GMT -5 killercupcake said:

We have count day in September about two weeks after school starts.

Nobody really got cut in our district though. We're already way understaffed. Unfortunately for us, 30 kids in a class isn't all that unusual here and is actually on the low side, especially in high school. Some counselors were surplussed, but they were moved to other schools.

High schools usually have 30-35. But we are talking first grade!

A lot of our elementary schools are around 30 at all times as well.

[sugarbear]

That's insane, and I hadn't heard of it. I'd be pissed, too.

[wildfloweragain]

No. Our community would flip out.

[joenali]

Oct 10, 2015 11:06:39 GMT -5 killercupcake said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:05:14 GMT -5 joenali said:

High schools usually have 30-35. But we are talking first grade!

A lot of our elementary schools are around 30 at all times as well.

Primary? If so that's ridiculous!

[killercupcake]

Oct 10, 2015 11:07:50 GMT -5 joenali said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:06:39 GMT -5 killercupcake said:

A lot of our elementary schools are around 30 at all times as well.

Primary? If so that's ridiculous!

Yeah.

But Nevada is also like 49th in the nation for a reason. I think we lost 500 teachers at the beginning of the year and were already looking for 700 before the year started.

ETA: this is for my specific district. But I'm sure the rest of the state is also in disarray.

[joenali]

Oct 10, 2015 11:06:07 GMT -5 sonrisa said:

So what happens? They look at which kids show up those 10 days? If a kid doesn't show up during those days, they aren't considered a student? And if so, how can they have counted 10 days in October since there have only been 7 school days? This puzzles me.

It's actually official on Monday. But they had to tell parents, students and teachers this week. And it's district wide, not just at one school. They look to see where they can make cuts. My school has the capacity for 250 kids, we are at 650 with 20 portables. No one anywhere should be cut. Oh. And the district did grow by several hundred students. The growth didn't meet projections so they are cutting.

ETA: the people making these projections should be removed. Not the teachers!

[joenali]

Oct 10, 2015 11:10:06 GMT -5 killercupcake said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:07:50 GMT -5 joenali said:

Primary? If so that's ridiculous!

Yeah.

But Nevada is also like 49th in the nation for a reason. I think we lost 500 teachers at the beginning of the year and were already looking for 700 before the year started.

We are 47th! You win! Lol!

[sonrisa]

That sounds ridiculous. Why do people fuck with education funding? And moving kids part way into the year? I'm annoyed on your behalf.

(I have to remember this when the local school district fundraiser points out it spends $1K/kid/year more than they get in state funding. I guess that is what it takes to avoid fuckery.)

[killercupcake]

Oct 10, 2015 11:12:21 GMT -5 sonrisa said:

That sounds ridiculous. Why do people fuck with education funding? I'm annoyed on your behalf.

Wanna hear the fucked up part...? It's our trustees and district who are fucking with our funding and teachers.

[sofamonkey]

You're Seattle SD, right? Didn't they just strike? I wonder what's going to happen now. That's incredibly shitty.

[joenali]

Oct 10, 2015 11:16:05 GMT -5 killercupcake said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:12:21 GMT -5 sonrisa said:

That sounds ridiculous. Why do people fuck with education funding? I'm annoyed on your behalf.

Wanna hear the fucked up part...? It's our trustees and district who are fucking with our funding and teachers.

It's our state! They (the legislature)are in contempt for not fully funding education and are being fined 100,000 a day for not getting their shit together. And according to the state's constitution funding education is the state's paramount duty.

[killercupcake]

Oct 10, 2015 11:18:13 GMT -5 joenali said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:16:05 GMT -5 killercupcake said:

Wanna hear the fucked up part...? It's our trustees and district who are fucking with our funding and teachers.

It's our state! They (the legislature)are in contempt for not fully funding education and are being fined 100,000 a day for not getting their shit together. And according to the state's constitution funding education is the state's paramount duty.

Geeze.

I don't get why this is such a fight. It doesn't make any sense. Fund the schools. Pay your teachers. See changes.

[joenali]

Oct 10, 2015 11:18:05 GMT -5 sofamonkey said:

You're Seattle SD, right? Didn't they just strike? I wonder what's going to happen now. That's incredibly shitty.

Yes we had a 5 day strike.

[redheadk]

No. For all the shit people talk about Texas education, the one thing we have going for us is that our class sizes have pretty strict caps. Max is 22 through 4th grade with a waiver for 23. It still seems too big, IMO. 28 1st graders is insanity, not to mention the pure craziness of letting teachers go in October and putting those kids in new classes. That is bad for everyone.

[nsl]

Oct 10, 2015 11:23:59 GMT -5 redheadk said:

No. For all the shit people talk about Texas education, the one thing we have going for us is that our class sizes have pretty strict caps. Max is 22 through 4th grade with a waiver for 23. It still seems too big, IMO. 28 1st graders is insanity, not to mention the pure craziness of letting teachers go in October and putting those kids in new classes. That is bad for everyone.

This was true in my old Texas district, but our central office was infamous for doing some pretty shady math about how they calculated the average number of students per class.  My English II classes were supposed to be capped at 22, but they were all over 30.  The district refused to show campuses their algorithm when we protested staffing cuts and class consolidations after the census because we suspected they were lumping resource classes into the averages, which made our ratios look much lower than they really were. 

[redheadk]

Oct 10, 2015 11:31:54 GMT -5 nsl said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:23:59 GMT -5 redheadk said:

No. For all the shit people talk about Texas education, the one thing we have going for us is that our class sizes have pretty strict caps. Max is 22 through 4th grade with a waiver for 23. It still seems too big, IMO. 28 1st graders is insanity, not to mention the pure craziness of letting teachers go in October and putting those kids in new classes. That is bad for everyone.

This was true in my old Texas district, but our central office was infamous for doing some pretty shady math about how they calculated the average number of students per class.  My English II classes were supposed to be capped at 22, but they were all over 30.  The district refused to show campuses their algorithm when we protested staffing cuts and class consolidations after the census because we suspected they were lumping resource classes into the averages, which made our ratios look much lower than they really were. 

Did you teach elementary? The cap of 22 is only through 4th grade. The upper grades have caps but they are higher. Some districts set their own caps.

Districts do some shady math, though, for sure. My old district has an extensive dual language program and they do some crap about averages in the grade, rather than by classroom, resulting in 23 kids in a growing district in traditional classes rather than have classes of 15. It sucks.

[xtine22]

Yes we have something like that in Florida. I do know that if they don't have room the teacher in their current school they are guarteend a position somewhere else in the county. The spot doesn't need to be in their current district.

[bigoleworm]

We have 29 students in an inclusion English class in 5th grade. And since there's already two teachers, they throw in all the basic skills and ell kids, plus all the 504 adhd kids. So you have maybe 3 typical kids and the rest need constant support.
But there's two teachers in there yo, so it's definitely okay.

[katfco]

I don't know the official day, but yes, my district does this. And almost all of the K-6 classes in our building are between 26 and 30. Most are closer to 30. One teacher has 13, but they're the overflow 3rd graders who didn't graduate to 4th grade. She might end up with a 3/4 split to reduce some of the 4th grade classrooms.

[livinitup]

No, nothing like this happens around here. And I have never heard of anything like that in NYS. Maybe a count day ... but never a re-organization based on it. Plans at the beginning of the year stay in effect all year.

[katfco]

Oct 10, 2015 11:40:12 GMT -5 bigoleworm said:

We have 29 students in an inclusion English class in 5th grade. And since there's already two teachers, they throw in all the basic skills and ell kids, plus all the 504 adhd kids. So you have maybe 3 typical kids and the rest need constant support.
But there's two teachers in there yo, so it's definitely okay.

I only have a couple of IEP kids in my classes, but a good number of my kids have severe issues due to trauma and poverty, and almost all of them are below or far below where they're supposed to be. Our max is 31 and I'm happy to be at 26. 

[Mrs. ChanandlerBong]

Michigan just had their count day last week. They highly encourage you to send your kids that day to make sure they're counted so the state doesn't take away that student's "match".

Detroit public schools has a history of "incentives" for your child to be at school on count day.


I believe they do another in February and that day factors into the school's/ district's budget for the following year.

[rugbywife]

This is typical in our system. There is a ratio of students for which they are funded. And the end of the third week of school they check numbers at each school and can either add a class, change the class organizations or reduce by a class. We call it September reorganization. It has to happen because the funding exists based on number of students - no student, no funding. The funding moves with the student.

[rugbywife]

Oct 10, 2015 12:13:35 GMT -5 TamiTaylor said:

Oct 10, 2015 11:34:39 GMT -5 redheadk said:

Did you teach elementary? The cap of 22 is only through 4th grade. The upper grades have caps but they are higher. Some districts set their own caps.

Districts do some shady math, though, for sure. My old district has an extensive dual language program and they do some crap about averages in the grade, rather than by classroom, resulting in 23 kids in a growing district in traditional classes rather than have classes of 15. It sucks.

Except there is no cap in 5th grade. . K-4 has a cap and then 6th grade does but not for 5th. It's really odd logic.

Our cap for 1-3 is essentially 20. 10% of the classrooms in the district can go to 23. 23 is the hard cap.

The average class size for 7-12 has to be 23.

The average for 4-8...26!! They get screwed.

[joenali]

Oct 10, 2015 12:14:02 GMT -5 rugbywife said:

This is typical in our system. There is a ratio of students for which they are funded. And the end of the third week of school they check numbers at each school and can either add a class, change the class organizations or reduce by a class. We call it September reorganization. It has to happen because the funding exists based on number of students - no student, no funding. The funding moves with the student.

But the district grew. It just didn't grow to the projected number. The budget is apparently based on projections. I want to know who is making these projections. And why aren't they being displaced?

[thatgirl2478]

Oct 10, 2015 10:59:37 GMT -5 joenali said:

We have what is called the October 10 day attendance count in the state and it happens at all schools. In the district I work in the numbers of students are lower than projected so they displaced 25 teachers and consolidated classroom across the district. . At my school alone they cut a first grade class of 22 and placed the students amongst 4 other first grade classes raising the class size to 28 or 29. They've also let go of a full time instructional aid in the Sped department. It's been awful for everyone.

Parents and teachers are outraged across the district. How is it right that there are now 29 kids in a first grade class? How is it right that students who have legally binding aid time now don't have it? Does this kind of crap happen where you live?

That sounds horrible!  I can't imagine that the children are receiving enough one:one attention in a class of this size .  I can't even begin to imagine the class management that those poor teachers have to deal with!

I have no idea if that happens in our current town.  My Mom taught first grade for 30 years (or so) and I don't recall it ever happening in her district - but she's been retired for over 10 years now.