Iowa City Looks to Find "Invisible" Kids to Help Address Crowded Classrooms

is developing a more accurate system for tracking students from the special education program as it attempts to solve class-size issues in the district, Superintendent Steve Murley said during a forum on Thursday evening.

But, it appears the bleeding won’t stop this school year.

“We are developing a system to count those invisible students,” Murley said.

In the current system, the district doesn’t “see” all of the kids in a general education classroom. This, along with an unexpected 444-student district-wide increase this year and a state-mandated spending cap, has spawned some classrooms with 36 percent more kids than the district average.

The so called "invisible" students are those in the special education program, many of whom are assumed to be taught separately. In reality, many are spending 80 percent or more of their day in the general classroom.

The discussion came during a forum with about 75 parents and teachers from . Longfellow has been banging the drum all school year about crowded classrooms through a letter writing campaign to the district and state legislators, a petition and by reaching out to the media.

Some technology classrooms lack enough equipment to accommodate all the kids, individual students don’t get the attention they deserve and the crowded classes creates a poor environment for students and staff, some parents and teachers say.

“I’m here and others are here because we are concerned,” said Lance Miller, who has three children at Longfellow. Some of their peers have opted to transfer to private school or started homeschooling, he said.

An Iowa City Press-Citizen review of district data shows 30 kids on average in Longfellow grades three through six classrooms compared to a district average of 25 for those grades and identifies four of the 10 largest class-sizes in the district are at Longfellow.

In reality, fifth - sixth grade classes at Longfellow have 34 children, including children from the special education program, and at times 37 bodies with staff, Principal Chris Pisarik said.

“There are issues here,” said Murley, who toured classrooms earlier in the day, and vowed to “fix the problems right now that we have the ability to fix.”

However, Longfellow is not the only school in the district with classroom problems, he said.

The district developed classroom sizes based on projections that showed 444 less students, and with the state's decision for no allowable growth the district's hands are mostly tied, Murley said. Murley said it would be unwise to dip into next year's budget before state budgeting decisions are made.

Murley said the district is exploring a few options for short term solutions. They are evaluating if staff can be shuffled around in the district to alleviate crowding issues, they will address technology shortfalls so there is enough equipment for all students in classrooms and no students in the district from Shelter House will no longer be automatically assigned to Longfellow, Murley said.

Murley said it would cost the district up to $1.7 million to get to preferred class-size averages: 22 for kindergarten, 24 for first and second grade, 26 for third and fourth grade and 28 for fifth and sixth.

Under the new calculation to better track students in the special education program, which is underway, the district is counting student-by-student using a 50 percent rule of how much time those students are in the general classroom.

It won't take long to complete the task, but an appeal hearing to the state for more money for teachers isn’t until March, at which point the school year is almost over, Murley said.

Parents pushed the district to dip into its savings, but that would violate the district policy which mandates reserves be 5 percent of the budget, Murley said.

“We have a really horrific situation here that really needs addressing now,” parent Maeve Clarke said.

The forum went for nearly two hours, and left some who were hoping for solutions less than satisfied, although some expressed optimism the district is addressing the problem in the long run.

“Not for this year, but I am optimistic things might improve for next school year,” said Paula Rocca, a third-fourth grade teacher with three children at Longfellow.