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District explains class-size targets: lowering targets costs about $1.5M per kindergarten student across the system
Summary
District operations staff told the board that lowering class-size targets would require large recurring investments (example cited: about $1.5 million per kindergarten-student-per-grade-level across the system) and described contingency staffing processes used to add classes in hot spots.
EJ Irmeter (K-12 operations) told the board that the district's class-size targets were established in 2015 and are used as a funding and staffing distribution model. He explained the arithmetic behind the targets and gave an example: lowering a kindergarten class-size target by one student across the system would require roughly $1,500,000 annually in additional funding for teacher positions and associated support.
Irmeter described how the district manages variability: monitoring daily enrollment in August and September, maintaining an FTE contingency for hot spots, and deploying additional classroom staff or ESPs when warranted. He cited Fernbrook as an example where two kindergarten sections were added before the year started and said staff will provide building-level averages to the board to show how boundary changes will affect class-size distribution in the coming year.
Board members asked for school-level averages and actual classroom counts to better communicate the effect of balancing schools and to show voters how referendum dollars are used; staff agreed to provide the requested detail.
