LASD Los Altos Superintendent’s Task Force – Where School Size Policy Comes From

The LASD Superintendent’s Task Force took a deep dive into

• capacity of our school sites vs. their current loading
• how attendance areas are determined
• the rationale for current school size policy

At this Jan. 8 meeting, there was an interesting presentation on “capacity” at the different LASD schools.  By capacity, LASD Business Manager Randy Kenyon means the the number of classrooms in the buildings…NOT counting portables. The key observation is that the junior highs, Egan and Blach, have excess capacity when compared with enrollment.  All the elementary schools are over-enrolled – except for Covington, which originally was actually a junior high site.

The over-enrollment at the elementary schools is handled with portables.  All the six school have some.  Mr. Kenyon said that the district owns and uses 25 portables and moves them around as needed.  Even more are rented for LASD use. [Lalahpolitico: It was unclear, but this count does not appear to include the portables used by BCS]

Mr. Kenyon said that the district owns and uses 25 portables and moves them around as needed.  Even more are rented for LASD use.

[notice]Download: LASD Los Altos Superintendent’s  Taskforce Packet 1-8-2013 (11M)/[/notice] [hr]

Chart 1 – LASD Elementary Schools Too Full

 

The fact that the LASD junior highs are about 100 students under capacity, led to a brief discussion of grade reconfiguration.  Specifically, grade configuration here means moving 6th graders to our junior highs.  As has been stated at LASD school board meetings, Superintendent Baier and the board prefer that any such reconfiguration be motivated by pedagogical issues, not facilities issues. [Alyssa Gallagher, superintendent for curriculum is studying the issue.] They have also stated that most 6th grade reconfiguration in districts across the state have occurred in conjunction with a facilities need. Baier said that LASD sixth graders are very successful in the current configuration. LALAHPOLITICO: Baier sounded somewhat reluctant to fiddle with 6th grade.  But does that tend to “take grade reconfiguration off the table” for the Task Force as an option?

according to LASD most 6th grade reconfiguration in districts across the state has occurred in conjunction with a facilities need, not for pedagogical motives

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[callout] Links to Articles on adolescence and grade reconfiguration…

Should Sixth Grade be in Elementary or Middle School   some pros and cons, cases, 2008

Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital – adolescent cognitive development

NYT – puberty starting earlier in boys

Los Altos’ Oregon sister city 2012 – Lake Oswego – puts 6th grade in Jr. High[/callout]

 

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Chart 2 – LASD Junior High Schools Too Empty

 

It was not discussed at this meeting, but Doug Smith has said in email this week that about 100 Blach attendance area students attend Egan.  This is because they will be attending LA High not MV High.  The district wants to ease their social and emotional transition.  Some Egan area residents concerned about traffic have asked that the policy be revisited. Alternatively, moving the Blach students back to Blach would leave more space for placing elementary age students on Egan… either in the charter or in a new neighborhood school.

Taskforce Packet 1-8-2013 (11M)

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Map A – the 43 “Critical Attendance” Areas

This is the demographer’s map identifying the location of the 43 “legos” of LASD  than can be combined into attendance areas. An area should ideally have recognizable boundaries, have a compact shape, have more or less 50 students, etc.

Before the 2007 redraw of school attendance areas, critical areas 14, 18 and 17, east of Foothill, used to be in either Santa Rita or Covington. That is a total of 59 students in 2011 that now cross busy Foothill expressway to reach Gardner school.

From the Lapkoff & Gobalet demographer’s report, p. 68 Table d-1, which shows 2011 enrollments, there are 298 students at Gardner.  35 of those are non-Los Altos School District, for 263 in-district students.  It is interesting to deduct the the 59 students, in “critical areas” 14,18, 17 on the map,  who live east of Foothill Expressway and were NOT assigned to Gardner prior to 2007.  These used to be Santa Rita and Covington students.  That reduces the Gardner “organic” LAH-University Ave. enrollment to 204 students in 2011.  As of 2011 “Gardner” is organically too small to be a school without the enrollment props Los Altos School District has put in.  Full size map image here of Map A.

To be clear, the old Bullis-Purrisima school in LAH always admitted Palo Alto kids right up to when it was closed in 2003.  That’s how come the Bullis Charter School orginally opened with about 30 out-of-district kids.  But by 2005, LASD asked the County to demand that the charter not be allowed to accept applications for the lottery admissions from out-of-district kids. The point is that it is not unusual for the Gardner school site to need enrollment props, like from Palo Alto.  Lalahpolitico:  Let’s not be hypocritical though.  LASD has kept ALL of the Palo Alto demand for itself.

Gardner school’s  “organic” LAH-University Ave. 2011 enrollment is just 204 students. Too small to be stay open without enrollment supports from Palo Alto kids and Santa Rita kids which bring in about 90+

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Map B – Students per Each “Critical Area”

 

To see the 2 page spreadsheet with the 2011 students by school, by grade, by critical area, that supports the two maps, look in the presentation packet Taskforce Packet 1-8-2013 (11M).  Click here for a larger map image of Map B.

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School Sizes – State Guidelines, LASD Policies

Randy Kenyon presented information from multiple sources.  The State of California wrote a Guide in 2000 explaining how school site planning methods originated and changed over time, and how school building changed with the times.  Our Los Altos school sites were designed using the Rule of Thumb method.  Our elementary schools are 10 acres, our junior highs are 20 acres. Covington used to be 20 acres, but about 5 acres were carved out for a park and city storage about 10 years ago.

The group seemed to agree that contemporary urban area land prices – sky high – meant that new sites need not meet these old acreage guidelines.

Figure a

 

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School Sizes – State Guidelines After Class Size Reduction

A State of California program in the 1970s to reduce class sizes created incentives for slightly greater acreage for a given student enrollment level. Here is a table that compares before and after guidelines for enrollment and acreage at small, medium, and large schools. The changes are not large.  And the group seemed to agree these guidelines were inappropriate for our area.

Figure b

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School Sizes – Current LASD Policy

A Task Force member asked Superintendent Baier why the LASD school sizes are at the low end of range of those described by the State of Calfornia.  Why no 1200 student schoosl in Los Altos?

Why are LASD School sizes at the low end of the State of California range…

Mr. Baier said large schools tend to unleash student behavior problems.   A Task Force member, a teacher with experience in a 1200 students school in Cupertino, said it was difficult to know everyone by sight, that students used that “anonimity to try to get away with more mischief than they would have otherwise.

 

Table 1 –  LASD Board approved sizes for an Elementary School

---

	Large		Medium		Small
	4 classes	(k-3)	3 classes	(k-3)	2 classes	(k-3)
	3 classes	(4-6)	2 classes	(4-6)	2 classes	(4-6)
GRADE
K	80		60		40
1	80		60		40
2	80		60		40
3	80		60		40
4	81	27/class	58	29/class	50	25/class
5	81	27/class	58	29/class	50	25/class
6	8	27/class	58	29/class	50	25/class
total	563		414		310
range	(530-580)		(400-440)		(280-330)

 Mr. Baier said large schools tend to unleash student behavior problems. That’s why the board has preferred smaller sizes through the years.

 

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Table 2 – Where Are  the Special Day Classes (SDCs)

LALAHPOLITICO: I had heard that only Covington School had facilities for our severely disabled students.  From the Jan. 8  info packet, it seems there are SDC classrooms in a few schools. Which ones are for medium-disabled? Perhaps the Task Force members should ask for information on the constraints that Special Ed and also English Language Learners (ELL) may place on school facilities planning? How does it affect County funding?

Covington has 3 special classrooms.  Loyola, Santa Rita, and Springer have 2 each. Where are the severely disabled? SDC class sizes seem to be much smaller at Covington, but what does that indicate?

 

	Covington	Loyola	S. Rita	Springer
SDC	4
SDC	4	7	7	6
SDC	5	8	8	10
total	13	15	15	16

Covington has 3 special classrooms.  Loyola, Santa Rita, and Springer have 2 each.
Where are the severely disabled?

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Talking about Talking, Facts & Opinions, PR & Platitudes

A couple of Task Force members said that too much time was being spent on “Talking about Talking.” The facilitator said to just signal a Time-out, and he would adjust the pace and change the topic.

Several Task Force members said members should try to clearly say when they are stating a Fact and and when they are stating an Opinion.  LALAHPOLITICO: This will be interesting to watch as members try to agree on the “facts.” The group agreed the numbers in the demographer’s forecast were actually an opinion. The history of past enrollment is taken as a fact.  [ Most numbers are manufactured on a best effort basis…so good luck judging their validity as a basis for the decision at hand. Make sure you understand what the number actually measures. And as for expert opinions…]

The group seemed to reject the guiding principle “Put the students first.” Several said it was a meaningless platitude. Randy Kenyon pointed out there were other stakeholders who should be considered perhaps equally, “seniors, taxpayers…”

One Task Force member is very eager to feed messages, quotable soundbits, and press releases to the media… [LALAHPOLITICO: apparently to have them broadcast …unadulterated by actual journalism.]

 

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Reference: a google search on “lazy journalism”

The new lazy journalism

…reflections of journalism bloger Seth Godwin, bemoaning the shrinkage of local journalism

Lazy journalism: the problem with telling both sides 

[info]”Mainstream journalists lazily make the all too common assumption that a simple representation of both sides, rather than a clear explanation of what is true and what is not true, is the ultimate path to objectivity. This standard of journalism is not one we should accept, yet it is perhaps the most prevalent way stories are transmitted to the public. The idea that stories must have two sides regardless of the facts of a situation is called false balance.”[/info]

Press releases in journalism: friend or foe?

“Faced with a deluge of information and tight deadlines, churnalism is increasingly common at newspapers. However, it is counterproductive to serious journalism. Some press releases are obviously newsworthy. They give journalists access to information with a verifiable source. On the whole, though, newspapers do not benefit when the line between journalism and PR becomes fuzzy. PR has its place in the news, but it is no substitute for real reporting.”

[notice] Here is the complete Jan. 8 Task Force presentation. Taskforce Packet 1-8-2013 (11M) as on the LASD website[/notice]