Class sizes in specific schools ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As others have pointed out, class size is a function of the MCPS cap (look it up) and the number of students per grade. Its a waste of time to assess a school based on class size.

Up until 4th grade my son's grade had just enough kids to have 6 classes so they had 6 small classes. The cap goes up for 4th grade so then they had 5 huge classes. The grade behind and 6 huge classes the whole way through.

exactly. for some reason my daughter's grade had a very large cohort so the class sizes were big. the grade below here has much smaller class sizes because there aren't as many kids overall. It varies every year.... They will add another class if they reach a certain point but for my daughter's class they didn't quite reach that point and left the class sizes large (27, 28, etc)

[Anonymous]

WA parent here, the 5 K classes are 23, 22, 22, 21 & 21.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:WA parent here, the 5 K classes are 23, 22, 22, 21 & 21.

Also it should be noted the school is built to 900 and has 600ish so facilities are new and hardly taxed. Do you know another elemtary of any size with a planetarium and a curriculum built around it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This won't get you very useful information. MCPS has countywide class size caps. So each year, you divide the number of students into classes as close to the caps as possible. Class sizes will vary from year to year depending on how many kids there are.

This

[Anonymous]

Cold Spring parent - DD's 3rd grade class - 17. Friends in 4th - 15. K - 21. 1st - 11. It's great.

[Anonymous]

As so many have said, info you get for this year really isn't all that useful for more than five years from now when you'll have a school age child.
At my son's school we sort of lucked out. Most grades have four classes, but my sons grade is slightly larger than average, so he has five classes. So his classes have been 22 kids each while the grade above him is always closer to 26. A few more kids move into that grade and their size will go down while if a few kids move out of my sins grade his class sizes will go up.

[Anonymous]

PP, nice humble brag.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As so many have said, info you get for this year really isn't all that useful for more than five years from now when you'll have a school age child.
At my son's school we sort of lucked out. Most grades have four classes, but my sons grade is slightly larger than average, so he has five classes. So his classes have been 22 kids each while the grade above him is always closer to 26. A few more kids move into that grade and their size will go down while if a few kids move out of my sins grade his class sizes will go up.

OP here. It's useful in a limited way, to be considered along with other factors. We are in WJ pyramid right now, renting and the amount of new multifamily developments just finished, in progress or already approved to start is staggering. Given that most of the Westbard development will be districted to Whitman, overcrowding is a valid concern to look at. I understand that it varies from year to year, but with the increase of density of housing, it will not go down. So the fundamental dilemma is whether to put more $$ into buying in the Whitman pyramid, or pay less for housing elsewhere and go private. Then other considerations get added in - like commute, resale value, etc. So I am still learning about the school stuff, but it's not a completely naive effort overall - the housing decision making process.

I'd like to thank separately the PPs who gave specific examples of class sizes and commented on facilities, etc. it's exactly what I was looking for.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cold Spring parent - DD's 3rd grade class - 17. Friends in 4th - 15. K - 21. 1st - 11. It's great.

eleven kids? and this isn't special needs? WTH

[Anonymous]

Is there only 1 class for the grade? Why would it not be a class of 22 if there is more than 1?

[Anonymous]

According to their website there is only 1 first grade teacher..but according to At a Glance there were 29 K-ers in 2015? Where did they go to have 1 class of only 11 first graders? Are parents worried about the future of the school. Can they justify a principal for less than 100 kids (if these small classes continue)? I guess if they do increase the HGC numbers this is one school that can pull in a lot of them!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:According to their website there is only 1 first grade teacher..but according to At a Glance there were 29 K-ers in 2015? Where did they go to have 1 class of only 11 first graders? Are parents worried about the future of the school. Can they justify a principal for less than 100 kids (if these small classes continue)? I guess if they do increase the HGC numbers this is one school that can pull in a lot of them!

They add a teacher to first grade when the K kids move up to first. That's what we have to do at our school because each grade varies so much in size.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:According to their website there is only 1 first grade teacher..but according to At a Glance there were 29 K-ers in 2015? Where did they go to have 1 class of only 11 first graders? Are parents worried about the future of the school. Can they justify a principal for less than 100 kids (if these small classes continue)? I guess if they do increase the HGC numbers this is one school that can pull in a lot of them!

They add a teacher to first grade when the K kids move up to first. That's what we have to do at our school because each grade varies so much in size.

oh oops misread your question. Good question. I'm waiting on Cold Spring poster to come back.

[Anonymous]

Also on At a Glance the staff to student ratio was 1:29 for K last year and 1:28 for 1 to 3 and 1:31 for 4 and 5. Doesn't seem like they have added extra teachers in the past.

[Anonymous]

At Whitman many classes are over 30 students in each class. My Dc's biology class has 34...... But if your kid is in elementary school now, who knows what it will be like by the time they arrive