Shrinking Budget Threatens Limit on Class Sizes

One bill aimed at raising the cap from 20 to 22 students per teacher in kindergarten through third grade won approval Wednesday in the state Senate's Education Committee despite opposition from teacher unions and parent groups. But a nearly identical bill was defeated in the Assembly Education Committee.

Other legislation that would raise the limit to as many as 25 students was still under consideration.

Dozens of school systems, meanwhile, are planning to raise their primary-grade classes to as many as 32 students to reduce their costs, as they anticipate overall reductions in state funding. Districts are allowed to opt out of the state's voluntary class-size program, but they forfeit $906 per student that the state pays for the smaller classes. Many districts said the state money does not cover the cost of extra teachers and classrooms.

Advocates of the proposed laws said the measures would give districts badly needed flexibility -- allowing them to exceed the current cap in some classes as long as they maintained a schoolwide average of 20 students in the primary grades.

That change would reduce the number of teachers that schools must hire and would free up classroom space. It would save more than $200 million, by one estimate, for school districts statewide, but could lead to layoffs.

"If we don't gain this flexibility, class-size reduction will die a slow, painful death," said Supt. Jim Fleming of Orange County's Capistrano Unified School District, which may partly withdraw from the state program and possibly raise class sizes in grades 2 and 3 next year to as many as 32 students to help close an anticipated $20-million shortfall.

Even if the state approves an increase from 20 to 22 students, the Capistrano district may still have to abandon class-size reduction in one of those grades and possibly cut 75 teachers' jobs, Fleming said. "I [may] have to give up what is arguably the most important reform initiative in the country in the last 20 years," he said.

Those who want to preserve smaller classes said the new bills, if enacted, would erode academic achievement gains realized since the reform was introduced seven years ago by then-Gov. Pete Wilson.