Parents and Administrators Discuss Size of Honors Class

Discussion regarding what the school district would do to keep class sizes as low as possible when faced with high demands for certain classes took place among parents and administrators during the recent board of education meeting.

Tina Hoffman asked the board if there is a limit as to how many kids can take certain courses if such high demand has resulted in a large class size. She told the board that her son registered for an honors social studies class that has about 35 students in it, which is above the average for a normal class size. She wanted to know at what point would the district decided to add another teacher or limit the class to a certain number of students.

Dr. Mark Porto, superintendent, explained that the class size may not be that high after the first two weeks of the school year as some honors classes tend to have a high attrition rate however he is aware that the class, which is a pre-AP US history course, can be conducted with that many students.

He said there is a classroom in the building that  can accommodate the number of students so there are no safety issues. Also they will be in the process of working with some of the students registered for the pre-AP class to see if they feel ready to instead take the AP US class which currently only has 12 students.

Porto said this situation with large class size was just specific to this one pre-AP course. All other classes are below 28 students. Some classes have as little as 24 students, he added.

He said the district will look into solutions for the future which could include bringing on an additional teacher for the course. Also he believes that in the future more students will feel they have developed the skills and confidence in order to go straight into the AP course.