Dear 2nd Grade Parents:

A reminder that tomorrow, Wednesday at 6 p.m., there will be a meeting in the Crest View cafeteria to learn more about the issues regarding fall enrollment of 89-90 2nd graders at Crest View. I have attached an agenda and will hand out copies at the meeting. Bring your questions and ideas! Let me know if I missed something. I have also attached this email as an attachment in case it gets mangled enroute.

To me there are three core issues to address tomorrow based on class sizes of 29-30: What impact is there on individualized instruction? And based on the levels of ESL and special education needs, is Crest View receiving enough resources to give teachers enough tools to effectively teach? What can we do to get more resources to teachers?

A few corrections to note in my previous email that included a lot of background information from Kristi Anderson. I identified her as Kristi Williams by mistake and apologize. In Kristi’s first point, she gave some enrollment numbers for Flatirons that actually belong to Foothill Elementary. Flatirons has 65 second graders and 2.5 teachers assigned. Foothill has 89 second graders and four teachers assigned. We will get the most up-to-date counts at the meeting, I’m sure.

For a comparison of class sizes at all BVSD elementary schools (all schools actually) as of 09-02-05, by grade, open this link: BVSD Enrollment Count 09-02-05

With the help of Margot and Bill Brown, there is a blog/information site in early development that is dedicated to information, comments and feedback gathered and contributed about this topic. Please feel free to comment and contribute. The site is at www.crestviewkids.com. I will mention it at the meeting and plan to provide a summary there of what takes place at the meeting.

Is there someone willing to take fairly detailed notes at the meeting tomorrow so we can provide a summary to parents who can’t attend? I’ll try but would like to focus on the discussion and a back-up would help create an accurate summary. Let me know if you can assist. Thanks.

Finally, here are some additional comments and questions received over the weekend. They may be helpful as background for the meeting:

********

“Second grade classes that are 50% larger than they were last year when our children were in first grade will also mean that the students will be getting sick more frequently, coming down with worse ailments, and missing more school as a result.”

“Mr. Levine’s letter that came home in the Friday Folders mentioned that 29 students per teacher is the “target” for second grade. I think the word “target” is being misused here. If 29 were really the “target,” we would be rejoicing at having reached our target. But it clearly is not anyone’s goal. If it really was the target, Foothill would have three second grade classes too. (They have about the same total number of second graders that we do, divided among four classes for about 22 per class which is what we would have if we had four classes too.) So we need to call it something else- I think “maximum” is more like it.”

“Mr. Levine also mentioned that they look at the number of “students per teacher.” I think looking at it this way penalizes large schools like ours. For example, instead of waiting for two more students to come before requesting more help, we are asked to wait for six more. Instead, we should look at the total number of students per grade level. 88 second graders should automatically get 4 teachers for 22 per class.”

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Here is an email sent by Kristi Anderson to school board and BVSD administrators on 9/3/05:

——– Original Message ——–

Subject:
Over Crowding Issue – Crest View

Date:
Sat, 03 Sep 2005 16:17:27 -0600

From:
Kristi Anderson

Reply-To:
kristi@abstract.com

To:
Ned Levine – Crest View Principal , Sheri Williams – BVSD Director of School Leadership , Julie Phillips – School Board President , George Garcia – Superintendent of Schools , Darci Mohr – Legal Counsel BVSD

CC:
Dawn Shulz – Crest View 2nd Grade Teacher , Mary Cox – Crest View 2nd Grade Teacher , Sofie Trujillo-Shrock – Crest View 2nd Grade Teacher

Dear BVSD Administrators and School Board Members,

Thank you for hanging in there with me while I gained clarity on the subject of Crest View’s overcrowding issue.

Every BVSD elementary school and K-8 with free/reduced lunch totals exceeding 16.4% of their student body population are currently receiving extra assistance, in the form of Target Schools which have small class sizes and/or the IB program. Except for Crest View which has a free/reduced lunch total of 23.6%.

There are 6 elementary schools with free reduced/totals of 11.7% to 16.3% of their student body population. I will call these six schools on Tuesday to find out what their class sizes are this year. If any of you have this information and could forward it to me it would save me time. These schools are: Birch, Eisenhower, Fireside, Gold Hill, Heatherwood and Nederland. These have never been schools that I hear of having large class sizes.

There are 18 elementary schools and k-8’s with free/reduced lunch totals of 0% to 9.2% of their student body population.

This is really the heart of the issue for me and many other parents. When you look at these statistics, why is Crest View being singled out?

We are merely asking for reasonable class sizes based on our demographics. This shouldn’t have to be something we have to fight for every year, it should just be provided to our school.

This is not just a second and fourth grade issue. It is an issue that continuously plagues our school.

The attached document list the above statistics school by school. The information was obtained from the BVSD School Profiles 2004 publication. They were confirmed on the BVSD website.

Again, thank you for your time.

Kristi Anderson
Crest View Parent

BVSD Elementary Schools

Free Reduced

Lunch Lunch Totals

Aspen Creek K-8 5.2 2.1 7.3

Bear Creek 3.3 0.3 3.6

Birch 9.9 4.7 14.6

BCSIS 7.3 0.8 8.1

Coal Creek 4.1 1.0 5.1

Community Montessori 4.1 1.4 5.5

Crest View 20.4 3.2 23.6

Douglass 2.3 0.4 2.7

Eisenhower 10.8 3.2 14.0

Eldorado K-8 1.9 0 1.9

Fireside 8.4 3.3 11.7

Flatirons 4.7 0 4.7

Foothill 3.0 1.3 4.3

Gold Hill 8.8 5.9 14.7

Heatherwood 9.3 3.0 12.3

High Peaks 0.7 0.7 1.4

Horizons K-8 2.6 2.3 4.9

Jamestown 0 0 0

Kohl 8.6 4.3 12.9

Louisville 4.9 2.5 7.4

Mesa 3.5 1.4 4.9

Monarch K-8 1.8 1.7 3.5

Nederland 12.1 4.2 16.3

Peak to Peak Charter 3.2 1.6 4.8

Superior 0 0 0

Target Schools

Columbine 83.2 3.8 87.0

Creekside 39.6 5.3 44.9

Emerald 38.0 8.6 46.6

Lafayette 19.5 8.1 27.6

Pioneer 41.7 12.4 54.1

Ryan 15.7 3.9 19.6

Sanchez 56.9 7.6 64.5

University Hill 54.5 6.9 61.4

*Target Schools have reduced class sizes – They are chosen based on these statistics.

International Baccalaureate Primary Years Program

Whittier IB PYP 26.5 5.5 32.0

Every BVSD elementary school and K-8 with free/reduced lunch totals exceeding 16.4% of their student body population is receiving additional assistance, except for Crest View.

**********

Thomas P. Gale

tom@mdm.com

Parents of Mrs. Shrock’s class:

Thanks for the feedback and replies so far to my email of last night concerning the large class size in Mrs. Shrock’s second grade class. There was enough positive response that I have scheduled and confirmed a meeting for Wednesday, Sept. 7 at 6 p.m. in the school cafeteria. A notice of this meeting is scheduled to be sent home in all second grade students’ Friday folder. I received several suggestions that it would be fruitful to include all second grade parents. Both Principal Ned Levine and Director of BVSD Elementary Schools Sheri Williams have confirmed their attendance.

This will be a valuable opportunity and first step. Please send any questions or information that you’d like to share with this email list. I will compile and send back out by Monday evening. Your input, concerns and questions may be helpful to others and to help focus the meeting so it is productive. So expect to see some good homework (no test) before the meeting. I am very committed for this meeting to not be a gripe session but to stay focused on the constructive ways we can help the second grade teachers do their best.

If you know other second grade parents who would like to join this independent information email list with no official connection to the school, please have them email or call me.

Thanks. Have a great and safe weekend, and I look forward to the meeting Wednesday.

Tom

Parents of Mrs. Shrock’s 2nd Grade Class:

This email is to follow up on the Tuesday night orientation meeting where we briefly discussed shared concerns of class size and the tight space in the room, an environment not conducive to second-grade learning. I volunteered to be a conduit of information in a timely fashion to anyone who wanted to get onto an email list for the class.

I spent an hour this morning in Crestview Principal Ned Levine’s office with fellow parent Kristi Anderson to get more information about what can be done to mitigate the problem. Here is a brief summary from my perspective on what’s happening:

Ned Levine is sending a letter in tomorrow’s Friday folder to provide his explanation of what’s going on and what the school is doing about it.
Ned said that Sofie Shrock is getting another one-hour paraprofessional to help in addition to the one hour assistance she told us about. She can decide how to deploy that extra help.
There are 88 second graders. Sofie has 30 kids and the other two sections have 29 each. This was a surprise to all as there were 75 first-graders at the end of last school year. An additional 13 neighborhood kids enrolled over the summer. A new class won’t happen because of district formulas.
There are some long-term issues and shifts in demographics that are impacting Crestview and will continue to. There is additional development in North Boulder that will potentially impact Crestview size.
There are a lot of complex issues and variables here, as well as district thresholds on class size before resources are allotted.

Here are a few personal thoughts on some of the issues that concern me and I’d like more information on:

What constructive steps can we take quickly as a group of parents to assist in fixing the immediate problem and pushing the school district to address it with all available resources?
Taken in context with what is happening in other parts of the district, I’d like more information to determine if there are inequities in the distribution of resources to neighborhood schools.
From my perspective, there appears to be a potential danger of allowing Crestview to degrade in its overall capabilities because of district management constraints. I am concerned whether there is a disconnect between the reality of the current and future demographics at Crestview and the resources devoted to the school.
We love the diverse and creative environment that helps to define Crestview. I’d like to find some solutions to the short-term problem in our kids’ classroom and gain more information to better understand what’s going to happen over the next four years through fifth grade. I’d like to help build an even stronger school. I’d like to avoid getting to a crisis point before getting engaged and getting additional resources mobilized.

I would find it helpful personally for our group of Mrs. Shrock’s 2nd grade parents to meet as soon as possible to share information, and to invite both Crestview and district representatives so everyone might learn more about the options, constraints, issues and potential solutions. As a group, we have a few choices. We can sit back and see what happens and how the school finds resources (or not) to mitigate what we all consider a bad learning environment. Or we can raise our voices to squeak the wheel to make sure that all possible efforts are made to create a better situation.

Please let me know by the end of the weekend (email or home phone 303-998-1137) if you think this meeting is a good idea or if you have other thoughts for how to proceed and move forward constructively. If there is enough support, I’ll try to set up the meeting. If there isn’t much support, then we can use the school’s formal communications to stay informed on its actions or lack thereof, and individually react. And please let me know if you’d like to be removed from this list. I am not sharing this list with anyone else, and only intend to keep it intact until it no longer serves what I understand its purpose to be — to keep us informed collectively about the class size/environment issue and to share ideas and concerns to help our kids gain a better learning environment in Mrs. Shrock’s class.

Sorry for the too-long email! I’m thankful that Sofie has such a positive attitude, and I hope that we can collectively find ways quickly to help her provide the best possible learning situation for our kids.

Tom

cc: Ned Levine, Crestview Principal

Sheri Williams, BVSD Director of School Leadership (Director of Elementary)

Sofie Trujillo-Shrock, Crestview Teacher

This information was compiled by Crest View second grade mother Kristi Anderson, who also has a fourth grader. Crest View’s fourth grade has had large class size issues the past several years as well. Received 9/2/2005.

Crest View

Many parents have voiced concern over the overcrowding of Crest View’s Second Grade. This is not just a second grade issue. This impacts all Crest View students.

Issues that face Crest View:

• Foothills Elementary School, when their class lists were posted 2 days before school started had 87 students listed as enrolled in second grade yet they were divided into 4 full time classes. Foothills profile is 4.3% Free/Reduced lunch and 0.6% English language learners. On this same day Crest View had 86 students enrolled in second grade with only 3 teachers. Crest View’s profile is 23.6 free/reduced lunch and 18% English language learners.
• Crest View’s free and reduced lunch participants have increased from 12.6% in 1999 to 23.6% in 2004. This number is expected to increase in the 2005 school year. BVSD uses these percentages to target schools that need additional assistance. These figures were obtained from BVSD School Profiles 2004. This publication is put out by BVSD Department of Planning, Engineering and Construction.
• Six years ago, BVSD identified 8 school based on free and reduced lunch percentages. These schools were given lower class size ratio’s – 18 to 1 for second grade. Last year Crest View’s free and reduced lunch participants surpassed one of the 8 targeted schools and has very similar demographics to another targeted elementary – these are Ryan and Lafayette Elementary Schools. Yet Crest View has not been approved to receive additional assistance in the form of smaller class sizes from BVSD. These figures were obtained from BVSD School Profiles 2004.
• The school district does not plan on redistricting for several more years. Redistricting changes school boundaries. Historically when these boundaries change current families and future siblings are allowed to stay at their current school. It would take years after the redistricting to impact Crest View’s enrollment.
• On 8/31/05 Sherri Williams called and stated that she and Joe Sleeper would be coming to Crest View to look for addition classroom space. I received an email from her on 9/01/05 indicating that they have decided not to do this until Crest View’s 2nd grade reaches 92 students.

Crest Views overcrowding is a result of many factors:

• The closing of Washington Bilingual School has permanently removed that as an open enrollment option for Crest View Families.
• Moving Community Montessori from Uni Hill to Columbine brought more students back to Crest View.
• The following year, moving Community Montessori from Columbine to South Boulder brought even more students back to Crest View.
• One of University Hills programs failed to meet academic standards this year. These students were allowed to move back to their neighborhood schools.
• Crest View is located in an area of Boulder that is still growing with new housing developments which results in more children moving into Crest View’s boundaries.
• Currently over 200 students in within Crest View’s boundaries open enroll to other schools in the district. The above changes have removed many options for families. This can have a significant impact on Crest View’s enrollment in the future.
• Crest View’s current student enrollment is 506 students. This is very close to maximum capacity for the school.

If you would like to be kept informed on these issues and/or put in contact with other parents who have similar concerns, send an email to: kristi.anderson@comcast.net or call 303 245 8008.
On a personal note, I believe that Crest View is a fabulous school which is in need of immediate class size reduction to keep it on track. Crest Views rapidly changing demographics put it at exceptionally high risk of crossing the tipping point that has occurred at other schools in our district. Restoring a school after the fact has proven extremely difficult. I have sent emails to the people listed below regarding my concerns. I have had long conversations with many of them as well. Crest View deserves to maintain its high academic standards and keep the great diversity that is currently has –we need help to ensure this happens.

Who to contact to voice your concerns regarding Crest View

:
Sheri Williams – BVSD Director of School Leadership
Don Orr – BVSD Director of Planning & Construction
Roger Hammond – BVSD COO
Joe Sleeper – BVSD C.O.O.
George Garcia – Superintendent of Schools
Julie Phillips – School Board President
Teresa Steele – School Board V.P.
Angelika Schroeder – School Board Member
Chris King – BVSD Educational Programs
Helayne Jones – School Board Member helayne.jones@bvsd.org
Jean Paxton – School Board Member ,
Ken Roberge – School Board Member
Stan Garnett – School Board Member
Ned Levine – Crest View Principal

*Ned will be sending home a note on Friday indicating that they are aware of the issues and that they will closely watch class size. Para pro hours will be given to make up for class sizes of 30 and more. This is a band aid – it is not a solution. Parent’s voices need to be heard. Without input from all of you nothing will be done until student numbers reach 92 in second grade.

2004 Profiles for Crest View, Ryan, Lafayette and Foothills Elementary Schools
Crest View
Category Percentage

Female… 50 %
Male… 50 %
African-American… 2.2 %
American Indian… 0.2 %
Asian… 8.1 %
Caucasian… 69 %
Hispanic… 20.4 %
Free Lunch… 20.4 %
Reduced Lunch… 3.2 %
English Language Learners… 18 %
Special Education… 11.7 %

Ryan
Category Percentage

Female… 50.7 %
Male… 49.3 %
African-American… 3.4 %
American Indian… 1.6 %
Asian… 3.7 %
Caucasian… 71.8 %
Hispanic… 19.6 %
Free Lunch… 15.7 %
Reduced Lunch… 3.9 %
English Language Learners… 8.4 %
Special Education… 14.1 %

Lafayette
Category Percentage

Female… 48.9 %
Male… 51.1 %
African-American… 3.6 %
American Indian… 0.9 %
Asian… 4.2 %
Caucasian… 70.9 %
Hispanic… 20.4 %
Free Lunch… 19.5 %
Reduced Lunch… 8.1 %
English Language Learners… 13.5 %
Special Education… 18.3 %

Foothills
Category Percentage

Female… 48.4 %
Male… 51.6 %
African-American… 0.9 %
American Indian… 0.2 %
Asian… 3 %
Caucasian… 93.3 %
Hispanic… 2.6 %
Free Lunch… 3 %
Reduced Lunch… 1.3 %
English Language Learners… 0.6 %
Special Education… 9.3 %