Research on Neighborhood-sized Schools
The Big Picture on School Costs
By David Cox
The discussion about school size, both with school boards and in the general public, will not be complete without considering the ancillary costs of big schools. These are harder to quantify than the capital and staffing costs of additional smaller schools. If these costs and liabilities are not considered, a shallow look could conclude that schools should be built bigger yet. Read More…
Small Schools Offer Real Hope for Communities of Color
by Dr. Augusta Souza Kappner
Not long ago, I traveled to Seattle to join a group of multicultural scholars and practitioners and the nation’s leading small schools (K- 12) scholars. We were meeting to discuss the potential benefits of small schools reform for minority communities. On at least one point we were unanimous: for urban centers and communities of color, most high schools are failing. Read More…
School Size
By Karen Irmsher
There is a natural predeliction in American education toward enormity,” said William Fowler (1992), “and it does not serve schools well.” Read More…
Some Findings About K-8 Schools
By Keith Look
The K-8 vs. junior high/ middle school issue has been a major issue for me the past few years. I was part of a project that attempted to convert a large struggling urban middle school and its 4 feeder elementary schools into 5 K-8 schools. We faced issues of curricula, budget, neighborhood boundaries, staffing, etc. There were lots of lessons learned. In fact, this became my dissertation recently completed. Read More…
Big Trouble: Solving Education Problems Means Rethinking Super-sized Schools and Districts
By David Cox
We Utahns love to have everything from our fast-food meals to our trucks “super-sized”; you might even say our families are “super-sized”! In many cases bigger is better, but not always. When it comes to schools and school districts, we as a nation have typically consolidated districts to make them larger under the assumption that bigger was better, specifically, more cost-effective with better academics. Yet several decades of super-size districts have called that notion into question for quality of services and even cost efficiency. Some districts might be too big, and might do better to DE-consolidate. Read More…
Smaller Schools and Districts 