Theresa Hobbs' daughter will start kindergarten in August, just in time for voter-approved limits on class sizes to take full effect.
Hobbs was one of 2.5 million voters who supported a 2002 constitutional amendment that is supposed to prevent her daughter's kindergarten class from having more than 18 children.
But after years of Florida making progress on smaller classes, she's disappointed that top lawmakers -- amid a severe budget crunch -- want to pull back from strictly limiting the number of children in each public-school classroom.
"We did vote on it. As far as not being able to afford it, I think they could dip into the lottery a little bit more than they do," said Hobbs, who lives in South Daytona. "There's definitely no reason it can't be done."
With the 2010 legislative session ready to start March 2, Republican leaders are making a priority of trying to change the state constitution to provide wiggle room on class sizes.
The idea still has a long way to go: Lawmakers would have to approve placing a proposed constitutional amendment on the November ballot where, ultimately, voters would have final say.
But along with backing from Republican legislative leaders, the proposed amendment has the support of Gov. Charlie Crist, politically powerful business groups and many school superintendents and school board members.
Lawmakers and school districts have gradually reduced class sizes since the 2002 amendment passed. The proposed changes, however, stem from a deadline to fully comply with classroom-by-classroom limits during the upcoming 2010-11 academic year.
The legislative proposal would largely lock in this year's class-size requirements, which are based on average numbers of students in classrooms. That would be far easier to meet than complying with caps on each classroom.
Volusia County Superintendent Margaret Smith said the proposal is a reasonable approach that the state can afford.
"I truly believe Florida has come a long way in reducing class size and I think we're at a level where we have increased student achievement," Smith said. "I don't think further reduced class size will really help."
TEACHERS SEE IMPROVEMENT
Despite the fierce objections of then-Gov. Jeb Bush, the 2002 amendment passed amid frustration in parts of the state that children were being crammed into classrooms.
Beginning with the 2010-11 school year, the amendment calls for teachers in pre-kindergarten through third-grade classes to have a maximum of 18 students. Teachers in fourth- through eighth-grade classes would have a maximum of 22 students, and teachers in ninth- through 12th-grade classes would have a maximum of 25.
The proposed amendment would keep those numbers of 18, 22 and 25 students but is designed to give schools more flexibility by using class-size averages. As an example, a high school could comply by having an average of 25 students in a class, though some classrooms might have more than 25 and some might have less than 25.
While the 2002 amendment has been controversial, several Volusia County teachers interviewed recently said they have noticed a difference since it passed.
"It was night and day," said Dennis Sallade, a science and geography teacher at Deltona Middle School.
Sallade and other teachers said the smaller classes allow them to tailor instruction better for individual students' needs and to provide better feedback about how students are doing. They've also seen fewer discipline problems.
Phillip Ransbottom, a biology teacher at Pine Ridge High School, said it is an insult to students and voters that lawmakers want to back away from the final step of capping class sizes.
"These kids are being told by the legislators 'we don't care about you,' " he said. "We voted in what we wanted; now all of a sudden they're going to come back and say 'you can't have it.' Did they not hear us?"
HIGH COST IN HARD TIMES
But supporters of changing the class-size requirements say fully complying could be a logistical nightmare -- along with costing hundreds of millions of dollars at a time when the state faces budget shortfalls.
Volusia County may need to hire an additional 177 to 369 teachers, depending on how the projections are calculated. Smith estimates the final number might be around 250.
That would carry a price tag of $14.5 million for pay and benefits in a year when school officials expect little extra funding from the state, an enrollment decline of 600 students and higher prices for necessities like health insurance.
Flagler schools are expected to need an extra 50 teachers to meet the amendment's requirements, Assistant Superintendent Janet Valentine said. That would cost about $2.5 million.
Smith, Valentine and other supporters of the proposed change also point to problems in complying with the strict caps, such as how schools would handle students who move during the year.
As an example, school officials said they might have to hire an additional teacher and redistribute students if a new student transfers into an elementary school where all of the classes in his grade are maxed out.
Sen. Don Gaetz, a Niceville Republican who is sponsoring the proposed constitutional change, said the strict class-size limits could force districts to even take steps such as busing children away from neighborhood schools. He said his concerns are "not a money issue.
"For me, it's an educational problem," said Gaetz, a former Okaloosa County superintendent.
But Ron Meyer, a lawyer for the Florida Education Association teachers union, said he doesn't think the proposed constitutional amendment is necessary.
Meyer said lawmakers could change state law -- without requiring a constitutional amendment -- to deal with the issue of students moving into schools. He said, in part, that schools could receive flexibility to exceed the limits by a few students during the middle of a year, so long as they made adjustments to comply during the next academic year.
In the end, Meyer said he thinks the proposed constitutional change results from lawmakers not wanting to spend the money to fully comply with the 2002 amendment. One estimate indicated the state might need to spend an additional $353 million next year to comply.
"It's about money," said Meyer, who has worked on the class-size issue for years. "There's no secret we're short of money."
linda.trimble@news-jrnl.com
jim.saunders@news-jrnl.com
