Prospectus Draft 1

Just like my HCP my APs problem will have to deal with class size, specifically
will reducing class size be worth the cost, or can similar achievements in student
academics be achieved through cheaper alternatives such as teacher effectiveness?
Unlike the HCP I will be taking a side, I believe that decreasing class size is not the
most cost efficient way to improve student achievement. When I say achievement I
am not saying just test scores, but also graduation rates, and college attendance
rates. The reason reducing class size is not the most effective way of increasing
student achievement is because the cost is too great, and if reducing class size is
implemented, then it will have to take resources from another program, or salaries
of the staff. If salaries are reduced, then how will they expect to hire more people
for less money? There have been plenty of studies on the benefits of reducing class
size, but they have been mixed, some say it is very effective, others say it didnt
produce any significant changes. Supporters of reducing class size have the opinion
that by reducing class size it will make individualization easier for students, and
they can have a better relationship with their fellow students, but will this affect
their learning in later years, which according to Matt Chingos suggests that it does
not matter if students were in a smaller class size early on, because they all
achieved similar results. My solution to the problem would be to focus on the
teacher, since they are the ones who educate the students, they must be effective,
but unlike supporters of the Gates Foundation, it would not be focused on test
scores, instead a focus on evaluations from students and teachers. If teachers are
known to be effective, then teaching bigger class rooms should not be much of a
challenge. Another thing I would look at would be which students are known to be
disruptive, and place them in special classes, this would help keep the bigger
classrooms more organized. One reason reducing class size is not a very liable
option is because of the costs, it is one of the most expensive things a school can
do, an example comes from Washington, with a majority vote of just 51% the law to
reduce class size was passed. With this passage it would cost the district $5 billion
to enact. The state would only receive $15 billion by the time the law is passed. The
reason it received so much support is because voters did not know the actual costs
of the law. After learning of the costs, the support went down to 46%. Another
argument that can be made is that by having more students in a classroom then a
teacher will spend more time on organizing the students rather than the actual
teaching. This argument is invalid if schools organize students better, such as what I
stated earlier about placing the more disruptive students into their own class, by
doing that then teachers will not need to fix disruptions created by these students,
and can remain organized. The problem with this solution is that, as brought up by
Ravitch, is that what will happen to these disruptive students, that class will surely
not be successful, maybe more teachers can be added to assist, but it will still lower
the schools overall test scores. A better solution would be to somehow get these
students to benefit schools, and not be such a problem for the rest of the students.
Also with bigger classrooms, teachers can be paid more, which could increase the
quality of a teacher by increasing competition for jobs. The supporters of reduced
class size do not have any solid evidence to support their claims, most use Project
STAR, which randomly assigned students to small and big classes, and those that

were in smaller classes performed better but the results are still not agreed on.
Unlike Project STAR, a similar class size reduction was passed in Florida, but the
results did not show any significant differences reducing class size, the cause could
be that Project STAR was done in a small group, but in Florida it was implemented
on a large scale. The advocacy I am promoting would be improving teacher
effectiveness by improving the way in which teachers are evaluated, instead of
evaluating teachers just off of the act of teaching but also the results these teachers
get and that they receive this information in a timely manner. Similar to a fitness
trainer they teach how to perform better, and they need evidence of their teaching
being effective which is where the results grading comes into play.

This image is data taken during project STAR which shows that smaller classes do
perform better than a regular class, which is not what I claim is wrong. I agree with
the fact that decreasing class size improves student scores. My problem is with the
most effective way of spending money. For the cost of reducing a class it is not
worth it because as can be seen by the graph it does not improve scores by much,
yet this sort of reform is one of the most expensive a school can undergo. One act
that was approved by voters, comes from San Francisco, the act is called The
Quality Teacher and Education Act (QTEA). The act improved salaries for teachers,
gave incentives for teachers to work at schools with historically high turnover rates,
teach in hard to fill subject area such as high school math, and increases teacher
support while increasing accountability. Since the act is recent, studies are still
being done to see if it was effective, so far it has done what it was meant to do.
Teachers are not leaving in schools with high turnover rates, and has attracted new
applicants, that way schools do not run out of teachers. The one problem it is

having is getting rid of ineffective teachers, and the incentives that are given to
teachers are relatively small, and some do not even know how much they received
from the program.

Abstract
In my essay I talk about why reducing class size is not the most cost efficient
way of improving student achievement. The achievement is not based just on test
scores, but also graduation rates, and college attendance rates. It covers the
arguments made by the supporters such as Project STAR, but then disputes it by
stating that other results of large scale implementations of small class mandates
have been less successful, and in fact not created significant student achievement
gains, especially for the costs. It will also describe the average costs to reduce class
size, and what else can be done using that same amount of money. It will also
provide a solution to the problem what is the most cost efficient way of increasing
student achievement such as increasing teacher salaries and organizing the
students, such as having more disruptive students placed in a special class to help
teachers that have bigger classes instruct with less disruptions.
Outline
I.

II.

Intro
a. The first sentence will be used as a way to lead the reader into my
topic, it will describe what I am talking about, and the second will
provide additional background information on the problem.
b. In the following sentences I will state my thesis and how I side on the
debate of class size, I can use some sources to support my side, such
as that class size reduction efforts have failed in the past and are not
the most reliable solution to improving student achievement.
c. To transition to the next paragraph I will state how these problems
started
Body
a. First
i. This paragraph will focus on possible causes to the problem, it
will also bring up some history of class size reduction that have
occurred, including project STAR or Wisconsin SAGE or California
CSRP. This paragraph is to help the reader understand that class
size reduction has been attempted multiple times, but due to its
high cost and not proven effectiveness has not been successful
b. Second
i. This paragraph will be about possible solutions to the problem
including allowing teachers to choose their students. Another
would be to hire the most effective teachers, of course the
disrupting students may hinder the best teachers, so I will
provide a solution on how to deal with this problem. The one
thing I can answer about teacher effectiveness, is that by
evaluating them based off of results they received and by
evaluations made during the school year can be beneficial if the

results at the end of the year are given to the teachers in a

timely manner and are proven to be accurate.

summarizes your source for its intrinsic qualities, states how you intend to
use this particular source, and demonstrates your understanding of this
sources value as a piece of evidence in your argument.
Bibliography
Peterson, Paul E. "Florida's Class Size Amendment: Did It Help Students Learn? Education
Next." EducationNext. EducationNext, 14 May 2010. Web. 05 May
2015.
This source describes causes for Floridas NAEP score increase. They describe the
possible different causes such as the class size reduction act, or the accountability
system or lastly its Just Read Initiative. Later it uses research from Harvards
Program on Education Policy and Governance (PEPG) that describes the boost in
scores is not due to class size reduction. I intend to use this article to support my
position that class size reduction is not worth the costs, as supported by PEPG.
Education Next tries to present the facts as clearly as they can without
incorporating any of their own ideology.
Chingos, Matthew M., and Grover J. Whitehurst. "Class Size: What Research Says
and What It Means for
State Policy." The Brookings Institution. Brookings, 11 May
2011. Web. 05 May 2015.
They describe what decreasing class size can do. It says that decreasing class size
will improve student achievement, but the gains are offset by the requirement of
hiring new teachers, and having multi-class classrooms. They also compare to
foreign countries, and the countries that score higher on the international tests are
ones that have larger class sizes, and better paid teachers. This source will be good
to use for supporting my idea that decreasing class size is not worth the costs,
because it will cause problems with other parts of a school such as teacher quality.
Also I can use it for comparing foreign countries and what they do that works. The
source is form Brookings Institution which is a think tank. They conduct research
and provide recommendations based on this research.
"Class Size and Student Achievement: Research Review." Class Size and Student
Achievement: Research Review. Center for Public Education, n.d. Web. 05 May
2015.
In this article they bring up different programs that have been used to reduce class
size including STAR CSR and SAGE. It suggest that reducing class size will improve
scores, but at a high cost to implement. Also many of the programs were
implemented quickly and effected many students, so it was difficult to get a control
group that would allow researchers to attribute score gains to reducing class size. I
can use this source to introduce the reader to the different class size reduction
programs that have been created and demonstrate the benefits and costs of these
programs. Center for Public Education was created by NSBA which has a bias

towards supporting class size reduction, so the information presented in the article
is favored towards reducing class size.
Muennig, Peter, and Steven H. Woolf. "Health and Economic Benefits of Reducing
the Number of
Students per Classroom in US Primary Schools." American
Journal of Public Health 97.11 (2007): 2020-027. Web. 17 Apr. 2015.
This source describes the cost of reducing class size, it also incorporates the cost
that a high school graduate has versus a dropout, stating that students in smaller
class sizes are less likely to drop out, therefore creating more money for the
government. They use STAR to describe the benefits of reducing class size. I could
use this to have a counter argument to my problem, also it describes project STAR
well. The journal is reliable and not as biased, they focus more on the health and
economic benefits of reducing class size, not on student achievement.
Wmann, Ludger, and Martin West. "Class-size Effects in School Systems around
the World: Evidence
from Between-grade Variation in TIMSS."European
Economic Review 50.3 (2006): 695-736. UC Irvine Libraries. Web. 5 May 2015.
This article is about foreign countries and compares the overall scores to class size.
In their findings they see that class size has a relatively low impact on student
performance if the teachers are more capable. In countries with less capable
teachers, they see that student performance increases when class size decreases.
The journal can be used to support my idea of increasing funding for teachers
versus class size, because it is shown that in other countries if teachers are better
students perform better whether in a small or large class.
Sinclair, Meredith N., and Tom Vander Ark. "Two Viewpoints." The High School
Journal 93.3 (2010): 94- 97. UC Irvine Libraries. Web. 6 May 2015.
The journal talks discusses Bills speech in 2010 for his Gates Foundation. They
describe how the current teacher evaluations fail to grade teachers accurately. They
demand changes in the structure of how teachers are to be paid, because it is unfair
that those who work harder are paid less or the same as those who do not work as
hard. They focus more on higher quality teachers and less on class size, which is
how I plan to use this source demonstrating that class size is less important, rather,
teacher quality and what the teacher does. The reason online learning doesnt work
is because it doesnt have all the aspects a real classroom has, such as face to face
interactions.
Egelson, Paula. How Class Size Makes a Difference. Greensboro, NC (P.O. Box 5367,
Greensboro 27435):
SERVE, 2002. Print.
The book demonstrates many different class size reduction plans that have
happened or were occurring at the time. One thing I noticed about the information
displayed was that the test scores for students in smaller classes were higher just
slightly, but that should be the case, since students in the regular classroom did not
receive any additional funding to make up for the cost of reducing class size. The
point gains for students in smaller classes is not very large, and for all the trouble it
caused would not seem worth it.

Johnson, Iryna Y. "Class Size and Student Performance at a Public Research

University: A Cross-Classified
Model." Research in Higher Education 51.8 (2010):
701-23. Web. 6 May 2015.
The journal talks about the effects of reducing class size, it first talks about the
history of the debate, which began in 1924. It found that students did better on
exams in larger classes, but not as well on essays. It goes on to describe that
previous studies on the effects of class size have found that larger class sizes do not
seem to reduce student performance, as long as the goal of the class is to seek
knowledge and academic skills. It also says that class size may effect some
students while having no effect on other students. I can use this source to support
my side of the argument and that why spend billions of dollars on class size
reduction programs if improvements are not to be seen by all students, when
instead funding teachers could improve student achievement.
Hattie, John. "The Paradox of Reducing Class Size and Improving Learning
Outcomes." International Journal of Educational Research 43.6 (2005): 387-425. UC
Irvine Libraries. Web. 6 May 2015.
The journal puts both sides of the argument at the beginning explaining why each
has occurred. He goes on to say that reducing class size may help improve student
achievement but it is not at all the most effective way. One question he asked
teachers was if they were able to reduce their current class of 30 by 5 students and
they choose, or he can reduce the class to 15 but the teacher has no say, the
teachers would prefer the first option. The reason is because a few disruptive
students can cause more problems than a large class without disruptive students. I
can use this article to support the idea that class size does not improve student
achievement as much as other policies can for the same costs.
Ehrenberg, R. G., D. J. Brewer, A. Gamoran, and J. D. Willms. "Class Size and Student
Achievement." Psychological Science in the Public Interest 2.1 (2001): 1-30.
Web. 10 May 2015.
This journal will be useful for me because it provides a reason why reducing class
size does not work, it also says that project STAR is not reliable due to the design
and implementation of the experiment. It further explains that even if class size is
reduced, it does not mean that teachers will change the way they teach which
means no matter how small a class gets the students achievement will not change
because the way the teacher teaches is not changing.
Tucker, Pamela D., and James H. Stronge. Linking Teacher Evaluation and Student
Learning. Alexandria,
VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum
Development, 2005. Print.
The book focuses on improving teacher evaluations, although that doesnt seem the
most relative to my problem, it describes that it is very important that students
have effective teachers to learn better. It explains that having an effective teacher
helps motivate students more than anything else. One problem I can see with this
source is that, as shown in Ravitch it describes that having three great teachers in a
row will benefit students. In Ravitch she puts down that idea because there is no

way to show that a teacher is more effective, but this book claims there are a few
qualities that can.