Obstacles Still Remain for Class-Size Reduction Plan

If schools get to hire new teachers under the class-size reduction plan agreement reached by President Clinton and congressional leaders, where would the extra classrooms come from?

And where are the skilled applicants willing to teach in urban or remote locations? What can help a district too small to hire even a single teacher under the population-based formula that’s been agreed upon?

The questions puzzle educators, even though they welcome the president’s bid for an army of 100,000 extra teachers in the next five years.

Despite this week’s budget deal offering an additional $1.3 billion and greater leeway in how it’s spent, hiring quality educators is far from a simple proposition once it gets to the local level.

“A teacher is just a teacher to most of the world,” said Richard Spacek, superintendent of a 145-student district in the Ozark town of Raymondville, Mo. “But there are a lot of different issues out there. The big one for us is how do we entice someone to come into our community--it’s not a very high pay base.”

For the second year in a row, Clinton has successfully argued that more schoolchildren, an aging teaching corps and the demands for a well-read, savvy work force all cry out for making smaller classes a national priority.

He also won $450 million for afterschool programs, an increase of $250 million. Funding for GEAR UP, a college preparation program, nearly doubled to $200 million.

The first round of money--$1.2 billion approved after a partisan budget debate last year--was doled out in July to most of the nation’s 16,000 school districts.

Based on calculations of the number of poor children in an area, awards varied widely. Big, urban districts got tens of millions of dollars. The smallest or the wealthiest only got a few hundred dollars.

The Raymondville district received $7,000 in new-teacher funds: “We had to make up the difference, and we’re on a really tight budget,” Spacek said.

Even if he gets more money this time around, Spacek worries about having enough classrooms to accommodate new teachers--or about having enough classroom space to accommodate computers.

“Facilities are almost impossible for a small district to build,” he said. “The only way to do it is with a bond issue.”

Additionally, school systems must find ways to attract or keep quality teachers. Under the new deal reached this week by Clinton and Republican lawmakers, the percentage of funds that could be used for training would increase from 15% to 25%.

Even in districts with enough room and skilled hires to reduce average class sizes, administrators still face the uncertainty of a lasting commitment: The agreement funds Clinton’s five-year proposal for just one more year.