Cut Class Size Without Moving 6th-Graders to Middle School, Parents Ask

SIMI VALLEY —  Worried that bumping sixth-graders from elementary to middle school will make them grow up too fast, a handful of parents have asked school trustees here to find another way to make room for smaller third-grade classes.

The polite but vocal parents also presented school board members with a petition that included more than 100 signatures of parents opposed to shifting the students into middle school.

Trustees voted Tuesday to shrink third-grade classes to 20 or fewer students beginning in February.

As part of a popular $771-million state initiative to improve reading, writing and mathematics, Simi Valley’s first- and second-grade students have enjoyed smaller classes since school began this fall.

Left unresolved at the meeting was how to find the 16 to 20 classrooms needed to extend the program to third-graders. The trustees of the 18,986-student school district are not expected to vote on that issue until the Dec. 10 meeting, at the earliest.

The parents who spoke out Tuesday clearly feared that trustees would turn to the least expensive facilities alternative--a $25,000 option that would involve displacing 1,400 sixth-graders from elementary to middle schools.

“I want very much for my daughter to be in a class of 20” next year, said Kay Ferguson, whose second- and fifth-grade children both attend White Oak elementary. “But not at the cost of moving sixth-graders to junior highs. It’s not worth it to me.”

Concerned about peer pressure, self-esteem and stress, White Oak parent Cheryl Burton, a mother of four, asked, “Why do we need to push our children into adulthood?”

Trustees have other issues to consider as well. The school district will shell out $1.2 million next year--above and beyond a $2.9-million state contribution--to cover teachers and support staff salaries for the smaller classes in the primary grades. And that doesn’t touch the facilities costs.

Most of the parents said they preferred other, costlier facilities options. They asked about an option of buying 16 portable classrooms for an estimated $980,000. Others inquired about reopening Arroyo Elementary, closed in 1983 for lack of enrollment, for about $1.2 million. No parents voiced support for a fourth facilities option--shifting to a year-round calendar for an estimated $100,000.

Valley View Junior High School teacher Peggy Noisette disagreed with the parents.

Moving sixth-graders to middle school offers them a gentle segue between the one instructor per day world of elementary school and the different teacher for each class realm of middle school.

Sixth-graders in middle school would have the same one or two teachers for core subjects such as reading, math and language arts while gaining access to electives including art, foreign languages and music, she said.

“Rather than helping our sixth-graders grow up more quickly, today’s middle schools allow our eighth-graders to grow up more slowly,” Noisette said.

Trustees were mixed on the facilities question.

The two strongest opinions came from trustees about to end their school board tenures--Judy Barry and Debbie Sandland.

Pointing to the success of a popular voluntary middle school program for sixth-graders in the nearby Conejo Valley, board President Barry said she strongly favors moving the students.

With about 50 empty classrooms in middle schools--vacated when ninth-graders moved to high schools in September--Simi Valley is ineligible to receive any of the $200 million the state has set aside for class-size reduction facilities.

At the other pole was Sandland, who just lost a bid for reelection. A foe of moving ninth-graders into high school, Sandland said she also vehemently opposes moving sixth-graders to middle school.

The three other trustees said they were not inclined to force sixth-graders to move.

Trustee Diane Collins, for instance, said she favored buying portable classrooms and allowing some sixth-graders to move to middle school on a voluntary basis.

The parents, hoping to sway trustees to their side, said they would continue to mobilize parental support against moving sixth-graders.

Vowing to visit church groups, soccer teams and elementary campuses, parents will gather more signatures, said Burton, impromptu petitions in hand.

“We got these signatures as a last-minute thing,” she said. “There will be more.”