Atlanta school district takes a step to reduce class size

Class sizes would shrink slightly in Atlanta public schools under a proposal approved Wednesday to hire 26 new teachers, paid for in part by cutting administration costs that are the highest in the metro area.

The Atlanta Budget Commission voted 3-1 to pass a $590 million budget for the upcoming school year after agreeing to spend at least $2 million toward reducing class sizes. The budget is planned for final approval June 27.

School board members didn’t decide what grade levels or schools should receive the class size help, instead opting to further study where they could make the most difference in a district with 3,226 teachers at the end of the 2013 school year.

“It will allow us to reduce class sizes in our critical areas of need. Twenty-six teachers can have a significant impact,” said Atlanta Board of Education Chairman Reuben McDaniel.

Class sizes in Atlanta in some cases are larger than Georgia guidelines, which cap them at 33 students in some high school classes.

School board members debated spending more money on classroom instruction instead of school administration, but Associate Superintendent Steve Smith said he doesn’t know where Atlanta Public Schools would find the money when the budget is already about $61 million short of being balanced.

The Atlanta school district plans to spend about 12.7 percent of its resources on administration, excluding Criterion-Reference Competency Test costs, according to an analysis by Robert Stockman, who runs the Financial Deconstruction blog. On average in Georgia, central office spending accounts for about 5 percent of each district’s operating budget.

A fraction of the money to hire more teachers, about $500,000, would come from undefined cuts to administration and possible furloughs for school employees at the assistant principal level and above. The other $1.5 million would come from the school district’s reserve funds.

Board member Courtney English voted against passing the budget because he said the school board hasn’t connected its spending plan to improving student achievement.

He questioned whether spending $2 million for a few more teachers would make a difference.

“I don’t necessarily know that putting an extra 20 or so teachers in a district with 3,000 teachers gives you much more bang for your buck,” English said during the meeting.

The school board discussed how much class size affects academic outcomes, and Deputy Superintendent Karen Waldon said class size matters, but not as much as having teachers who can get through to students.