Every year, principals hire teachers and staff for their schools based on projected student enrollment. These projections are usually fairly accurate, but sometimes more or fewer students arrive at their school than expected — and that leaves them with difficult choices in organizing their schools and assigning students to classes. WCPSS principals work to find the best, most supportive classroom environment for every child within some difficult constraints.
For example, the state has strict requirements for class sizes from kindergarten through third grade. An older school facility may not provide enough classroom space to serve larger classes. Or the school may not have high enough enrollment to permit the hiring of additional staff. Principals weigh many of these issues when they have to react to situations such as imbalances on year-round tracks or over-enrollment at a particular grade level.
When these situations arise, principals restructure the school. If there are enough resources in the budget — schools are allotted positions based on enrollment — and the facility supports it, principals can create new classes. Otherwise, solutions might include:
- providing team-teachers, where students are assigned to two teachers that may share the same location;
- multi-grade classes such as a combined first- and second-grade class;
- collapsing year-round tracks or moving students to a different track;
- or losing positions and consolidating classes through the budget reconciliation process.
None of these situations is ideal, although changes such as team-teaching or combined-grade classes can provide strong academic environments through greater opportunities for differentiated instruction.
Especially in a time of tight budgets, WCPSS principals have the responsibility to be careful stewards of their funding while assuring strong academic support for every child. As in previous years, we anticipate that some year-round and traditional principals will have to restructure their schools in response to enrollment changes. WCPSS Central Services staff will support them in every way we can. If you have any questions, please contact your school’s principal.