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Post by macrockett on Dec 7, 2011 13:45:31 GMT -6
.... ..... To date not a single person has presented a counterargument to the long and winding road, for example. ....to finish that High School that was never necessary. As far as I have looked, and I looked very extensively several months ago, there is no other comparable, K-12 multi-HS school district in the entire country (excluding urban, large low income demographics) that chooses to operate mulitple >4000 enrollment HSs, Can you show me any other comparable district in which their long and winding road led those citizens to the conclusion that two or more mega-schools were the best way to deliver HS education to their students? (Truly, I wish I had considered this more back when our district led us to the freshman campus model) I believe the majority of 204 residents will be very statisfied operating HS with enrollments of ~ 2500-3000-3500 for the forseeable future, next decade and more. Here's some more facts for you Gatordog. In the DuPage regional area of Illinois we have 6 School Districts (200, 201, 202, 203, 204 and 205). Three of those five have approximately 8000 kids or less. What do you think the size of their HSs are? Not very large. webprod.isbe.net/ereportcard/publicsite/searchBySchool.aspx?searchby=districtName&language=english&year=2011&keyword=indian+prairie&type=card&rcds=190222040So did they build small HSs in these three Districts because that was the politically acceptable size or did they do it because they didn't have the students to justify a larger capacity high school? I grew up in Bloomington, population around 72000 now. That is District 87. www.district87.org/reportcards.htmlEnrollment 5200 students approx. So if grades are reasonably balanced, there are about 1200 in HS, or well below 2000 (as 9th grade is in a junior high). What do you think the capacity of that high school is? Why did they set the capacity under 2000? Now how School Districts have a population base of 72k or more like Bloomington? www.citypopulation.de/USA-Illinois.html (here are illinois city populations that might give you an idea) There are some that consolidate into a school district like Bolingbrook and Romeoville (District 365) and have high schools over 2k (here, bigger than Neuqua with 3691 student. (Parents must be screaming bloody murder.) webprod.isbe.net/ereportcard/publicsite/searchByProfile.aspx?searchby=districtName&language=english&year=2011&keyword=365u&type=profile&rcd=56099365UWe could look at the list of biggest School Districts in the country: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_school_districts_in_the_United_States_by_enrollmentOr we could just cut to the chase and take a look at a data base that has virtually every high school in the country by state and also including size: proximityone.com/highschools.htmHmmm looking at Illinois HSs, it looks like the vast majority of those schools have fewer than 1000 students, I would say close to 50% from what I see. So maybe you should go back to your research and come up with another theory as to why there are so few +3000 HSs. I know what my theory is, but I can just look at the DuPage Regional area to figure that out! So much for "optimal size"........ Have a nice day Gatordog. |
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Post by doctorwho on Dec 7, 2011 16:41:03 GMT -6
As far as I have looked, and I looked very extensively several months ago, there is no other comparable, K-12 multi-HS school district in the entire country (excluding urban, large low income demographics) that chooses to operate mulitple >4000 enrollment HSs, Can you show me any other comparable district in which their long and winding road led those citizens to the conclusion that two or more mega-schools were the best way to deliver HS education to their students? (Truly, I wish I had considered this more back when our district led us to the freshman campus model) I believe the majority of 204 residents will be very statisfied operating HS with enrollments of ~ 2500-3000-3500 for the forseeable future, next decade and more. Here's some more facts for you Gatordog. In the DuPage regional area of Illinois we have 6 School Districts (200, 201, 202, 203, 204 and 205). Three of those five have approximately 8000 kids or less. What do you think the size of their HSs are? Not very large. webprod.isbe.net/ereportcard/publicsite/searchBySchool.aspx?searchby=districtName&language=english&year=2011&keyword=indian+prairie&type=card&rcds=190222040So did they build small HSs in these three Districts because that was the politically acceptable size or did they do it because they didn't have the students to justify a larger capacity high school? I grew up in Bloomington, population around 72000 now. That is District 87. www.district87.org/reportcards.htmlEnrollment 5200 students approx. So if grades are reasonably balanced, there are about 1200 in HS, or well below 2000 (as 9th grade is in a junior high). What do you think the capacity of that high school is? Why did they set the capacity under 2000? Now how School Districts have a population base of 72k or more like Bloomington? www.citypopulation.de/USA-Illinois.html (here are illinois city populations that might give you an idea) There are some that consolidate into a school district like Bolingbrook and Romeoville (District 365) and have high schools over 2k (here, bigger than Neuqua with 3691 student. (Parents must be screaming bloody murder.) webprod.isbe.net/ereportcard/publicsite/searchByProfile.aspx?searchby=districtName&language=english&year=2011&keyword=365u&type=profile&rcd=56099365UWe could look at the list of biggest School Districts in the country: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_school_districts_in_the_United_States_by_enrollmentOr we could just cut to the chase and take a look at a data base that has virtually every high school in the country by state and also including size: proximityone.com/highschools.htmHmmm looking at Illinois HSs, it looks like the vast majority of those schools have fewer than 1000 students, I would say close to 50% from what I see. So maybe you should go back to your research and come up with another theory as to why there are so few +3000 HSs. I know what my theory is, but I can just look at the DuPage Regional area to figure that out! So much for "optimal size"........ Have a nice day Gatordog. Doesn't every school district build 3000 seats when they need 600 ( and decreasing) Mike ? again only a few school districts even have this opportunity to build larger schools as you state- and when they do -- New Trier / Stevenson being the two largest- the results have been pretty damn good. When we reach Stevenson's status, ( let alone New trier) someone let me know. Stevenson at a Glance •Enrollment: 4,044•Average Class Size: 22 •Students Bound for College: 97% •Attendance Rate: 95.8% •Graduation Rate: 96.3% •Expenditure Per Student: $13,706 •Average ACT Score: 26.2 ◦No. of Seniors Taking Exam: 1,065 ◦Mathematics: 26.9 ◦English: 26.6 ◦Science: 25.3 ◦Reading: 25.2 •SAT Scores: ◦No. of Seniors Taking Exam: 135 ◦Mathematics: 679 ◦Reading: 632 ◦Writing: 629 •Advanced Placement: ◦Students Taking Exams: 1,649 ◦Exams Written: 3,786 ◦Honor Grades Earned: 87% ◦Average AP Exam Score: 3.91•PSAE Scores ◦% Meeting or Exceeding State Standards ◦Mathematics: 89.4% ◦Science: 87.1% ◦Reading: 84.3% |
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Post by macrockett on Dec 8, 2011 7:32:56 GMT -6
Doesn't every school district build 3000 seats when they need 600 ( and decreasing) Mike ? again only a few school districts even have this opportunity to build larger schools as you state- and when they do -- New Trier / Stevenson being the two largest- the results have been pretty damn good. When we reach Stevenson's status, ( let alone New trier) someone let me know. Stevenson at a Glance •Enrollment: 4,044•Average Class Size: 22 •Students Bound for College: 97% •Attendance Rate: 95.8% •Graduation Rate: 96.3% •Expenditure Per Student: $13,706 •Average ACT Score: 26.2 ◦No. of Seniors Taking Exam: 1,065 ◦Mathematics: 26.9 ◦English: 26.6 ◦Science: 25.3 ◦Reading: 25.2 •SAT Scores: ◦No. of Seniors Taking Exam: 135 ◦Mathematics: 679 ◦Reading: 632 ◦Writing: 629 •Advanced Placement: ◦Students Taking Exams: 1,649 ◦Exams Written: 3,786 ◦Honor Grades Earned: 87% ◦Average AP Exam Score: 3.91•PSAE Scores ◦% Meeting or Exceeding State Standards ◦Mathematics: 89.4% ◦Science: 87.1% ◦Reading: 84.3% [/quote] I don't know Doc, that 4044 must be a typo, maybe it's 2044. No HS that has an enrollment materially above 2000 can have achievement like that. There are just too many kids in one place. Besides, it wouldn't be politically correct to have such a big facility, which is more to the point. In my opinion, however, you need to understand clearly, now more than ever, that resources are finite. If you don't start allocating those resources effectively and efficiently to the goal of educating out children we have failed in our responsibility. |
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Post by gatordog on Dec 8, 2011 7:45:37 GMT -6
.... So maybe you should go back to your research and come up with another theory as to why there are so few +3000 HSs. I know what my theory is, but I can just look at the DuPage Regional area to figure that out! So much for "optimal size"........ First, you moved the goal posts just a little bit: I was thinking about >4000 student HS. My main point is I am not offering any"why" theories at all at HS size. I am merely making an observation. I am just stating the fact that no other school district similar to ours, (non-urban, not a single HS district) has chosen to organize with multiple HS's at 4000-4500 students. Universally, they choose to organize their two or more HS's to <4000 students. This is a fact. (As far as I can tell....somebody could proved me wrong). I admit its quite surprising to me, but I could not find a single school district anywhere in the country that made the decision that their district should operate with multiple mega-HS's at 4000+ students. I am not commenting here to review educational theory journals or have an academic theory disscussion about optimal size of HS. That is not at all the point here. I am not offering any theories at all as to why these other school districts made those HS size choices. Again, I am just making a factual observation. Yes, this is a bit of the historical "what-if" game. But it strikes me that if 204 decided not to build MV, and instead indefinitely operate WV and NV at 4500 students, this would have been quite radical. Something no other district similar to ours was doing. |
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Post by macrockett on Dec 8, 2011 11:27:22 GMT -6
.... So maybe you should go back to your research and come up with another theory as to why there are so few +3000 HSs. I know what my theory is, but I can just look at the DuPage Regional area to figure that out! So much for "optimal size"........ First, you moved the goal posts just a little bit: I was thinking about >4000 student HS. My main point is I am not offering any"why" theories at all at HS size. I am merely making an observation. I am just stating the fact that no other school district similar to ours, (non-urban, not a single HS district) has chosen to organize with multiple HS's at 4000-4500 students. Universally, they choose to organize their two or more HS's to <4000 students. This is a fact. (As far as I can tell....somebody could proved me wrong). I admit its quite surprising to me, but I could not find a single school district anywhere in the country that made the decision that their district should operate with multiple mega-HS's at 4000+ students. I am not commenting here to review educational theory journals or have an academic theory disscussion about optimal size of HS. That is not at all the point here. I am not offering any theories at all as to why these other school districts made those HS size choices. Again, I am just making a factual observation. Yes, this is a bit of the historical "what-if" game. But it strikes me that if 204 decided not to build MV, and instead indefinitely operate WV and NV at 4500 students, this would have been quite radical. Something no other district similar to ours was doing.
With all due respect Gatordog, you make no sense. Do you actually believe the above statement? If so, then put some facts behind it to prove your point, including some evidence that it was done because they felt that smaller schools are better. In Chicago, I see no evidence whatsoever of that. In the burbs I have not looked at all of the evidence, however, at least Bolingbrook and Romeoville have consolidated into one 3600+ HS and in Oswego the SD just reversed course on building another HS looking for a more reasonable solution. In fact, every statement you make above is riddled with confusion. You say " I admit its quite surprising to me, but I could not find a single school district anywhere in the country that made the decision that their district should operate with multiple mega-HS's at 4000+ students." My response is just exactly what research did you do to make that statement? Not one school district? Anywhere in the country? Would you be willing to pay me $1000 for each one I can find? I will be glad to spend the next 6 months at that rate. Even I wouldn't challenge that there may be some Districts where schools were split to make them smaller. To do so, I would have to check every single District in the country. What I would challenge, however, is that in doing so it was based on any empirical evidence that proved smaller schools are better for students. If the evidence out there showing that smaller classrooms, endorsed by the NEA, concludes that class size has no material effect on learning, then it is pretty clear why there is no body of evidence that exists concluding school size affects learning. Given that, it would be just an opinion, a desire on the part of administration or parents to have smaller schools. We have already seen from our own survey that parents and taxpayers rejected that logic and wanted to add on to existing schools. However the Board, in its own flawed logic and research, never allowed that as an option. It was new HS or split shifts. Two extremes to say the least. Which leaves me to believe that you are actually in a small minority of parents/taxpayers who are willing to allocate limited resources to bricks and mortar rather than using them to hire more teachers or buy more IT, things that are directly involved in providing our children with a better education. |
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Post by gatordog on Dec 8, 2011 13:01:57 GMT -6
mac, this is regrettably hashing over old topics. This really is old news. There is no suburban school district in the country with demographics like ours that operates multiple 4000+ enrollment high schools. At least I could not find one, and I looked fairly hard. Even if I missed a few (I would be interested in knowing that) the undeniable conclusion is they are exceedingly rare. I can see how a single-HS district, with one and only one high shcool, has reasons to remain a single HS district. Yet there arent many of those actually. The IL HS mentioned here all fall in the single-HS-within-a-district category. Even the IL schools not touted for their high performance, such as Warren HS. Once districts (like ours demographically) open two or more HS's, they establish schools smaller than 4000 students. My data seeking and research isnt a secret. Its posted over on the old green board. ip204.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=highschool&action=display&thread=3799&page=2 |
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Post by gatordog on Dec 8, 2011 13:10:25 GMT -6
...... "I am just stating the fact that no other school district similar to ours, (non-urban, not a single HS district) has chosen to organize with multiple HS's at 4000-4500 students. Universally, they choose to organize their two or more HS's to <4000 students."
With all due respect Gatordog, you make no sense. Do you actually believe the above statement? yes, i believe this. I have not found any school that disproves this. clarificiation: "school district similar to ours, (non-urban, not a single HS district) " better expressed as "school district similar to ours, (non-urban, with two or more high schools within the district) |
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Post by macrockett on Dec 8, 2011 22:41:35 GMT -6
mac, this is regrettably hashing over old topics. This really is old news. There is no suburban school district in the country with demographics like ours that operates multiple 4000+ enrollment high schools. At least I could not find one, and I looked fairly hard. Even if I missed a few (I would be interested in knowing that) the undeniable conclusion is they are exceedingly rare. I can see how a single-HS district, with one and only one high shcool, has reasons to remain a single HS district. Yet there arent many of those actually. The IL HS mentioned here all fall in the single-HS-within-a-district category. Even the IL schools not touted for their high performance, such as Warren HS. Once districts (like ours demographically) open two or more HS's, they establish schools smaller than 4000 students. My data seeking and research isnt a secret. Its posted over on the old green board. ip204.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=highschool&action=display&thread=3799&page=2Thanks, but I don't need any help sleeping... Gatordog, there are over 24,000 high schools in the United States per IES, as of 2009: nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=84 These 24,000 HSs are part of over 14,000 School Districts, per the U.S Census Dept. www.census.gov/did/www/schooldistricts/But we can jell it down to your statement: "Once districts (like ours demographically) open two or more HS's, they establish schools smaller than 4000 students."Lets just assume that your statement is true (which hasn't been established by any comprehensive study that I am aware of), District 204 would have satisfied that criteria with two HSs and two freshmen centers. Had we added on to Neuqua another 725 seats, it would have had less than 4000 students, more like 3750 based on what I have seen. In any case, no Neuqua block of 3 grade levels coming through our District, that I could find, had over 1333 students. In addition, we would have saved a hell of a lot of money in construction savings AND $3.5 million annually for another set of administrators and operating costs. Thanks for agreeing! |
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Post by doctorwho on Dec 9, 2011 8:13:02 GMT -6
mac, this is regrettably hashing over old topics. This really is old news. There is no suburban school district in the country with demographics like ours that operates multiple 4000+ enrollment high schools. At least I could not find one, and I looked fairly hard. Even if I missed a few (I would be interested in knowing that) the undeniable conclusion is they are exceedingly rare. I can see how a single-HS district, with one and only one high shcool, has reasons to remain a single HS district. Yet there arent many of those actually. The IL HS mentioned here all fall in the single-HS-within-a-district category. Even the IL schools not touted for their high performance, such as Warren HS. Once districts (like ours demographically) open two or more HS's, they establish schools smaller than 4000 students. My data seeking and research isnt a secret. Its posted over on the old green board. ip204.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=highschool&action=display&thread=3799&page=2Thanks, but I don't need any help sleeping... Gatordog, there are over 24,000 high schools in the United States per IES, as of 2009: nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=84 These 24,000 HSs are part of over 14,000 School Districts, per the U.S Census Dept. www.census.gov/did/www/schooldistricts/But we can jell it down to your statement: "Once districts (like ours demographically) open two or more HS's, they establish schools smaller than 4000 students."Lets just assume that your statement is true (which hasn't been established by any comprehensive study that I am aware of), District 204 would have satisfied that criteria with two HSs and two freshmen centers. Had we added on to Neuqua another 725 seats, it would have had less than 4000 students, more like 3750 based on what I have seen. In any case, no Neuqua block of 3 grade levels coming through our District, that I could find, had over 1333 students. In addition, we would have saved a hell of a lot of money in construction savings AND $3.5 million annually for another set of administrators and operating costs. Thanks for agreeing! easy solution- SD is too damn big then if there are no comparisons. If Northern section is growing like a weed- split it off and do so by a REAL map and distance..no some convaluted out of scale drawing a 5 year old could have done. NO AREA goes to the school furthest from it's doors. NONE - period. |
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Post by macrockett on Dec 9, 2011 9:41:23 GMT -6
Thanks, but I don't need any help sleeping... Gatordog, there are over 24,000 high schools in the United States per IES, as of 2009: nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=84 These 24,000 HSs are part of over 14,000 School Districts, per the U.S Census Dept. www.census.gov/did/www/schooldistricts/But we can jell it down to your statement: "Once districts (like ours demographically) open two or more HS's, they establish schools smaller than 4000 students."Lets just assume that your statement is true (which hasn't been established by any comprehensive study that I am aware of), District 204 would have satisfied that criteria with two HSs and two freshmen centers. Had we added on to Neuqua another 725 seats, it would have had less than 4000 students, more like 3750 based on what I have seen. In any case, no Neuqua block of 3 grade levels coming through our District, that I could find, had over 1333 students. In addition, we would have saved a hell of a lot of money in construction savings AND $3.5 million annually for another set of administrators and operating costs. Thanks for agreeing! easy solution- SD is too damn big then if there are no comparisons. If Northern section is growing like a weed- split it off and do so by a REAL map and distance..no some convaluted out of scale drawing a 5 year old could have done. NO AREA goes to the school furthest from it's doors. NONE - period. Doc face it, in the end May Watts was "collateral damage" to JC and MM. In fact there was "significant" distortion to make this work. I'm not sure whether this was a calculated plan from the beginning or was just poor due diligence. Either way when all is said and done D204 parents, taxpayers and especially our children will pay the heavy price, as assets will not be allocated to where they should be going (let alone the dislocation and transportation issues it created). |
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Post by gatordog on Dec 9, 2011 12:01:26 GMT -6
easy solution- SD is too damn big then if there are no comparisons. If Northern section is growing like a weed- split it off a... Too big? And here I thought you were a proponent of economies-of-scale when it comes to educational organizations....saves money!  Seriously though, there are plenty of school district comparisons. Plenty of SD's about our size. |
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Post by gatordog on Dec 9, 2011 12:32:33 GMT -6
...... ...., taxpayers and especially our children will pay the heavy price, as assets will not be allocated to where they should be going .... I guess across the country every other district ( similar to ours) also poorly allocates resources as well, being that they failed to take advantage of the opportunity to save money and create mega-high schools. There are plenty of school districts as big as 204, or larger. Here is a list of the largest school districts in the country. asumag.com/asu100/2010/enrollment/Plenty of these are metropolitan area suburbs like we are here. If you have 30,000 students or more, this is at least 2500 students per grade. This means the SD could, if they choose, establish two or more HS’s with 1000 students or more per class. For total enrollment of 4000+. If anybody wants to learn anything, one could take a look at any one of these districts websites. Invariably, from what I have seen, districts that are suburban and reasonably affluent don’t operate mulitple 4000 student high schools. A typical example (and you can look for yourself): you will see a district run six or eight HS’s with 2000 enrollment each. Instead of three or four HS’s with 4000 enrollment. I am not trying to explain why this happens. Just that it does. To take this discussion further, and into the future, it will be interesting to see as government funding in general dries up, maybe more SD's will advocate expanding some of their existing high schools to beyond 4000 students. And not opening new schools, or perhaps phasing out others. This is a generic question, nation-wide, and will take years to see how it plays out. We made our decision here in 204. Other districts will make their decisions. Maybe I will revisit my thinking and data gathering on what happens elsewhere in five years or so. |
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Post by macrockett on Dec 9, 2011 17:53:26 GMT -6
...... ...., taxpayers and especially our children will pay the heavy price, as assets will not be allocated to where they should be going .... I guess across the country every other district ( similar to ours) also poorly allocates resources as well, being that they failed to take advantage of the opportunity to save money and create mega-high schools. There are plenty of school districts as big as 204, or larger. Here is a list of the largest school districts in the country. asumag.com/asu100/2010/enrollment/Plenty of these are metropolitan area suburbs like we are here. If you have 30,000 students or more, this is at least 2500 students per grade. This means the SD could, if they choose, establish two or more HS’s with 1000 students or more per class. For total enrollment of 4000+. If anybody wants to learn anything, one could take a look at any one of these districts websites. Invariably, from what I have seen, districts that are suburban and reasonably affluent don’t operate mulitple 4000 student high schools. A typical example (and you can look for yourself): you will see a district run six or eight HS’s with 2000 enrollment each. Instead of three or four HS’s with 4000 enrollment. I am not trying to explain why this happens. Just that it does. To take this discussion further, and into the future, it will be interesting to see as government funding in general dries up, maybe more SD's will advocate expanding some of their existing high schools to beyond 4000 students. And not opening new schools, or perhaps phasing out others. This is a generic question, nation-wide, and will take years to see how it plays out. We made our decision here in 204. Other districts will make their decisions. Maybe I will revisit my thinking and data gathering on what happens elsewhere in five years or so. Gatordog, some times i think you don't even read what i write. Most of the Districts in the United States have one school, with few students, like 3 out of the six in the DuPage Region, which are less than a third our size. Second, while there may be other school districts of our size, or even smaller, and while they may chose to have two or several smaller high schools (if they even have more than one high school), it doesn't change the fact that there are no definitive studies that say smaller is better. Please show me the vast body of evidence proving that point, and it is in direct contradiction of what studies show about the effect of class size on learning. Third, the residents of this District, District 204, clearly indicated a preference to add to existing schools rather than build a third HS, however they weren't given the choice. Read the results of the survey and read the referendum. There was clearly no serious debate on this point. Finally, it should be clear that we will never need the capacity that we have built, spending far in excess of what we needed to. In addition, we will be spending an additional $3.5 million (growing exponentially over time) annually. It doesn't matter to me what other districts are doing. It is there choice. Those are facts Gatordog. If you believe what District 204 did was a good thing, I have no problem with that, but please don't ask me to deny the facts that are right in front of all of us. Further, what other Districts do does not change the facts I have listed here. We have exhausted this subject so let each person decide which side they come down on. When I do bring this up, I do it based on new news that I believe reflects on exactly what I have been saying for over two years (along with a number of other people.) Currently we are facing a $8.1 million shortfall in our FY2013 budget. We have already cut $30 million out of out budget over the last three years. We will continue to be pressed because of the exponential nature of salaries and benefits. Notice even Dave finally uses the word "exponential." Nuff said. |
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