Crowded Anaheim District Staggers Classes

ANAHEIM —  Confronted with some of the most crowded schools in the county, Anaheim City School District trustees took the unusual move Tuesday of adopting a staggered class schedule for about 6,400 first- and second-grade students.

The board unanimously voted to place 16 schools on a schedule that overlaps morning and afternoon shifts as of July 1--perhaps the first district in the county to take such action. Such schedules are more common in kindergarten classes countywide.

Under the plan, there will be a 71-minute period, not including lunch and recess, in which both sessions will share class space, with two teachers for 40 students. Morning sessions will run from 7:45 a.m. to 1:01 p.m. and afternoon sessions will start from 10:40 a.m. to 3:56 p.m.

“We are in a crisis,” trustee Betty Patterson said. “This a creative solution when everything else has failed.”

Staggered schedules were proposed to the board by a committee of parents, teachers and community members who studied different types of scheduling as a way to accommodate the increasing student population.

Trustee Susan Preus said the committee found that placing students on a staggered schedule is a better alternative than double sessions, when the days would start too early and end too late.

Benefits of staggered classes:

* Allows the district to maintain the 20-1 teacher-student ratio;

* Provides a temporary solution to overcrowding while permanent solutions are studied;

* Helps the district attract new teachers because of the low student-teacher ratio;

* Helps accommodate enrollment increases for the next two years;

* Preserves special state funding for classes with reduced sizes.

Opponents of staggered classes say the district is just luring parents into double sessions. Gilbert Morena, a committee member and Stoddard Elementary School parent, said Tuesday that although the committee voted 91% in favor of the plan, most members were district staff and not parents. He said most parents don’t know about the staggered sessions.

Supt. Roberta Thompson said the staggered schedules would be a temporary solution until new classrooms are built.

A bond measure that increases property taxes by $22 per $100,000 of assessed value to fund new classrooms will be on the April 14 ballot.

Currently, all of the district’s 22 schools run on a year-round schedule. School officials said this is the first major enrollment increase to hit the district since the 1950s.