Class size max goes back down
By JENNIFER KELLEY
Cherry Hill Sun
5/31/2007

BOE rescinds vote on increasing fifth-grade class sizes; restores three teaching positions

The Cherry Hill Public Schools Board of Education voted 8-1 on May 22 to lower the fifth-grade class-size maximum back down to 24 students, in addition to restoring three teaching positions that had been cut from the 2007-08 budget.

BOE member Susan Badaracco was the only board member to vote against the move, noting she would not support the measure even if the money could be found elsewhere in the budget.

And, by meeting’s end, the $171,000 needed to return three fifth-grade teachers to the roster was indeed found elsewhere in the budget, with board members taking the recommendation of Assistant Superintendent of Business James Riehman to tap into extra funds resulting from salary breakage – the difference between the salary of retiring employees and new hires.

There are about 30 teachers planning to retire by July 1, according to the district’s public information officer, Susan Bastnagel.

The policy reversal came after a coalition of parents from Horace Mann, Russell A. Knight and Richard Stockton elementary schools repeatedly approached the board about its March 27 decision to increase the fifth-grade class maximum from 24 to 25 students for the next school year. Soon-to-be-graduating fourth graders at the three schools – who currently enjoy class-size averages of 18 – would see about a 40 percent increase in classmates when they returned next year, as each school lost a fifth-grade teacher and section as a result of the decision.

The other nine elementary schools would not feel such a dramatic impact from the policy change next year because their current fourth graders are already in classes hovering between 21 and 25, Bastnagel said.

Preliminary discussions on last week’s vote were held at a May 15 special meeting of the Business and Facilities Committee, at which many of the concerned parents were allowed time to address the small subcommittee of board members and Superintendent David Campbell. Funding options for restoring the cut fifth-grade positions were discussed at the meeting, including the salary breakage option.

On May 22, the committee’s co-chair, Sharon Giaccio, recounted the discussion for board members not present at the meeting, and Riehman explained why salary breakage money was the best funding option.

The vote came after comments by a number of parents and students in favor of the smaller class size.

Bastnagel told The Sun that the $171,000 would be a recurring cost, but that board members take a fresh look at all of the budget’s features each fall, and the fifth-grade class size increase had the potential to be approached again in the coming years.

“The budget process is a series of tough decisions – decisions that involve every position in the district, not just three fifth-grade teachers,” she said. Administrators – and eventually board members – must make tough choices throughout the long, arduous process, which usually begins as early as September, she added.

Bastnagel also noted that when the process begins early in the school year, administrators don’t know how many retirees or how much breakage they’ll have at the end of the year.

As such, board members made what they believed to be the best decision for the district in March, she said – “and sometimes those decisions are revisited.”

BOE Vice President Bob Russo warned the meeting’s attendees that the policy reversal did not guarantee that fourth graders would return to the exact same class sizes next year, noting that if the fourth-grade class at Stockton went down by just two students, the sections would have to be reconfigured and could be boosted up to the 24-student maximum.

But regardless of what may come, the 50 to 60 parents present at the meeting were all smiles and applause when board members re-voted on the class-size measure. Prior to the May 22 vote, some of the parents who actively engaged the board on the matter told The Sun that they were just glad that the BOE heard them out and agreed to place a re-vote on their May agenda.

Board President Anne Einhorn said that because of the parents’ intense efforts to have the issue addressed by the end of the school year, the BOE skirted its usual procedure for changing a district policy.

“The process (for changing something like this) is a thorough cycle. The issue ordinarily would have gone to our Policy and Planning Committee and then presented at one of the board’s work sessions, after which it would have been put – by consensus – on our action agenda (for June),” she said, noting that the board skipped that process, instead addressing the matter more expeditiously at the Business and Facilities Committee meeting.

“We went outside the realm of our natural process in order to satisfy the community’s concerns,” she added.