Small Schools Movement - Positive Benefits

Positive Benefits

Supporters of small schools claim that "in small schools, student achievement increases, particularly for minority and low-income students. Student attendance improves, graduation rates rise, and college going rates increase. Students are more engaged in their studies and are more likely to participate in extracurricular activities"

Positive gains for student achievement within small schools can be seen in Oakland California. According to a study by the Annenberg Institute for School Reform "small schools in Oakland are outperforming the large schools from which they emerged. In particular, students are completing more rigorous coursework and dropping out at lower rates, compared to the large schools."

According to The American Dream and the Public Schools by Jennifer L. Hochschild and Nathan Scovronick, smaller classes sizes contribute to students in "early grades, and consistently challenging academic courses have been demonstrated to help disadvantaged children achieve, just as they enable middle-class children to achieve."

"Smaller, more intimate learning communities consistently deliver better results in academics and discipline when compared to their larger counterparts. Big schools offer few opportunities to participate" (WashingtonPost, 8/15/02). "Students at large schools are more prone to be alienated from their peers or engage in risky behavior" (University of Minnesota research, Los Angeles Times, 4/12/02).

Other benefits of small schools are noted in a study conducted by UCLA stating that "at their best, small schools are seen as enhancing strong personal bonds, home and community involvement, improved instructional quality and accountability, and improved teacher working conditions and job satisfaction."

Leading small schools proponent Dr. Stuart Grauer notes, "Research shows overwhelmingly that small schools lead to greater student academic gains and personal adjustment. In fact, data justifying this has been available for decades; it's just that policy makers have largely ignored it, no doubt due to the costs of such programs (and, of course, the politics). Right now, armed guards, metal detectors, and expulsions fail to get to the heart of the problem. (To a serious extent, they can actually create repressive conditions which make the problem worse.) Consequently, many people are looking for another way, and small schools can't be ignored much longer." Why do we keep building gigantic schools when we have such promising data? Dr. Grauer attributes this not only to economics, but to prevailing myths about American education: "Our collective memory of high school includes nostalgia such as proms, football games, exciting social lives, romance, and first cars. No matter that such memories do not apply to most students. The average high school student does not attend sporting events; indeed the larger the school, the smaller the percentage of student participation in these activities. For most students, the social scene in large high schools is tough and unforgiving, with sharp distinctions made between the small group of social haves and the far larger masses of have-nots. And high school memories seldom include a significant academic component, let alone an intellectual one ( 2001). In other words, many high schools have activities that everyone speaks of with pride—sacred cows like the marching band, the lacrosse team, the boosters. These untouchable activities represent the school's image, and they can't be changed, even though they serve a very small percentage of students and rarely have any connection to the most basic thing of all: the focus on student learning."

Small schools are gaining popularity in the United States not only with students, but with donors as well. According to the Neal Peirce Column of the Washington Post Writers Group, " Far and away the biggest catalyst is the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It has poured over $1 billion in five years into promoting smaller schools in Boston, Chicago, Milwaukee and other cities. Just this month New York City announced it was coming on board the small schools movement. It will open 60 schools with 500 students or less -- 41 high schools, four traditional middle schools and 15 based on an innovative sixth- or seventh-through-12th grade model."

Research and the growing data on small schools have provided some evidence regarding their better academic quality in comparison to their larger counterparts.

According to Dr. Sharif Shakrani, the Co-director of the Education Policy Center, "Recent studies suggest students in small public high schools perform better academically, have higher attendance rates, feel safer, experience fewer behavior problems and participate more frequently in extracurricular activities."

Shakrani also states that "a number of empirical articles document that students in small public and private high schools have higher achievement levels than those in large schools. Studies found higher student gains in reading, mathematics, science and social studies at small high schools than at large schools. Moreover, small schools are more likely to have fewer incidents of violence and misbehavior and that, in turn, has been found to contribute to higher attendance and lower drop-out and truancy rates."

Small schools tend to emerge, particularly in urban areas, where there is a need for education reform due to failing school systems. High quality small public schools act as a remedy to large public schools that are falling behind in their ability to graduate students, achieve higher test scores and provide students with individual attention. The small school movement has modeled its efforts after small private schools which provide a similar learning environment which is based upon providing for the needs of their students.