I just received a press release from the Chicago Teachers Union, alerting the public that CPS plans to close schools and to increase class sizes. To call this “reform” is outrageous. The children in Chicago needs smaller classes, not classes of 35-40. A teacher who is a “high-quality” teacher in a class with 24 students will not be a “high-quality” teacher if placed in a class of 35-40 students. Many of the students will have disabilities, or language learning issues, or behavioral problems. Instead of instruction, the teacher will spend most of his or her time on classroom management. This is just more of the corporate reform babble; neither Bill Gates nor Michael Bloomberg ever put their own children in classrooms with 35-40 students. Why do they want to do that to other people’s children?

Below is the CTU press release:

CPS Target of 30 to 40 Students in a Classroom is a
Dangerous Benchmark for Utilization ‘Crisis’
If 80 schools are shuttered class sizes will balloon

CHICAGO—The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) opposes the larger classroom sizes that Chicago Public Schools (CPS) targets as “ideal” in its threats to close 13 percent of the city’s neighborhood schools by the end of this school year. Both research and teacher experience indicate that smaller class sizes, particularly at lower grade levels, contribute to increased learning and optimal classroom activity as teachers are better able to modify instruction to meet the needs of individual children and better communicate with their parents.

A recent press report indicated that the so-called “utilization crisis” manufactured by CPS is based on the assumption that 30 the ideal number of students for an “average class size.” Because the typical Chicago classroom has far fewer than 30 students, raising the target figure to 30 made it easier for CPS to manufacture a utilization crisis and use that as justification for closing scores of public schools.

“What CPS has done is damaging on two fronts,” said CTU President Karen GJ Lewis. “First, they’re misleading the public with this space ‘crisis’ they’ve created using their own benchmark, and second, the benchmark they’ve set is much higher than the city and state average and what we know provides the best environment for our students to succeed.”

CPS class sizes are already among the highest in Illinois. Last year, early grade classrooms in the city were on average larger than those in 95 percent of the districts in the rest of the state. Classrooms in CPS high schools had the fifth highest class size compared to other districts in Illinois. Many high schools and elementary schools slated for turnaround actions in recent years had multiple oversized classrooms.

Tennessee’s Project STAR (Student Teacher Achievement Ratio) found that smaller class sizes had positive effects at the early childhood level (k-3),  across all school locations (rural, urban, inner city, suburban), on every achievement measure and for all subjects (reading, mathematics, science, social science, language, study skills).

The study also found that students assigned to small classes of 15 students in early grades graduated on schedule at a higher rate (76 percent) than students from regular classes  of 24 (64 percent). The same students also completed school with an honors diploma more often than students from regular classes and dropped out of school less often (15 percent) compared to the regular classes (24 percent).

“Smaller class sizes are a proven school policy that works, narrows the achievement gap and is manageable for both our teachers and students,” said CTU Research Director Dr. Carol Caref.

Echoing education reformers Bill Gates and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, CPS Communication Director Becky Carroll was quoted in the press saying that a teacher of high quality “could take 40 kids in a class and help them succeed.”

Lewis said, “This just evidence of what we’re dealing with at City Hall and CPS–insults and untested hypothesis.  This is the result of having decision makers who are completely out of touch—or just plain ignorant—when it comes to what’s going on in the classroom.”