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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]33 in 4/5 compacted math.[/quote]

Does everyone see this as normal? There are umpteen gazillion posts about CES and magnets, but people just shrug their shoulders and accept it as fine if their 4th grader has 33 kids in their class? [/quote]

Practically speaking, what do you think is going to happen if parents make a big stir about big compacted math/enriched literacy classes?  (And 33 isn't even that big, 28 is standard.).

If you believe all schools should have these advanced classes and cohort the kids together, you're going to have times when the classes are on the larger side, because you can't just expect that that number of qualifying kids will conveniently always fall in a typical class size range.  The alternative to 1 class of 33 is two classes of 16/17, while the lower-performing kids then end up with much larger classes because you've shifted another teacher (going from, say, 4 classes of 25 to 3 classes of 33, or from 3 classes of 25 to 2 classes of 37.)  That is just not a reasonable ask.

I strongly suspect that this kind of thing is a big part of why MCPS dropped the enriched literacy cohorting requirement.  It would be lovely to have cohorted classes with normal class sizes at all times, but unfortunately it's just not possible to get everything you want here.  If you want kids cohorted into advanced classes, you have to live with the fact that those classes might be big sometimes.  If instead you complain to principals and central office that your child's advanced class is too big, they are going to throw up their hands and push to get rid of cohorting altogether because they feel like there is no way to satisfy parents so they might as well just do whatever is easiest for them.[/quote]

It's not just advanced classes that are large. My kid's ES class has 32 kids this year.  And no, I don't think people should just sit quietly and do nothing when there's a class of 40 in compact math and their kid is asked to sit on the floor.  You can have two classes of 20.  MCPS has a billion dollar budget.  Cut the fat from the central office, and put more teachers in classroom.  It's not hard to find an elementary school math teacher.[/quote]

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