Sunday's Camera (June 20, 1999) printed a collection of some two dozen essays by
Boulder County teenagers expressing their views on violence in society. These
essays were motivated by the tragic killings of students and a teacher at
Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado earlier in the year. The essays
were excellent.
One particularly perceptive teenager got straight to the heart of the matter
when she wrote:
I would not blame the school board, or the protection of the school
itself, but the size of the school population. When there are around 2,000
kids crammed into one building and 30 or so kids in each class, there are
bound to be some serious problems that go unnoticed ... I go to a school
that has around 100 students total. The main focus of our school is
'community.' We focus our energy to meet everyone, feel equal to everyone
(including the teachers and students), to get to understand each others
views on different subjects, and to feel welcome and accepted ... Since our
school is so small, we can have all-school discussions where everyone can
be heard.
This student sees what many of our community leaders choose not to see.
She recognizes that bigness in societal groups is the catalyst that causes
breakup of the big population into smaller separate sub-populations based on the
members’ views of shared problems, values, and "solutions."
Another student wrote: "When a student seems to be taking a U-turn with
their school work, someone should be concerned." The bigger the school the
less likely this is to happen.
Another student made the observation: "I believe that giving a sufficient
amount of personal attention to today's youth would be a forward step to ending
teen violence." This student is calling for the personal attention that is
diminished and destroyed by bigness in our schools.
Another student observed that: "Most of these teenagers attend public
schools where a single teacher may have as many as 150 to 200 students in one
semester, leaving them barely enough time to even memorize their names. I
believe a reasonable solution to this problem would be to hire more teachers in
the public schools, allowing for smaller classes."
It is clear that these young people recognize that bigness is the central cause
of the problem.
"I mean half of the kids out of 26 kids in my entire eighth grade class ...
are leaving to go [next year] to either Boulder, Fairview, or Niwot, all public
high schools. At our school we are so close we are like sisters and brothers.
When the shootings happened at Columbine, it scared the life out of us because
we, or our friends, are going to [these big] public high schools next
year."
Yet another perceptive student wrote: "The solution I can think of for
schools is advisor programs, where kids at first get comfortable with an adult.
Trust is built and friendships are made. The advisor has a group of no more that
15 kids, so there is more one-on-one attention. When one of the kids is having
trouble, the advisor can do something about it before something happens. At the
school I go to, we have an advisor program. I know it works, because I use it
every day."
Another student, from a larger school wrote: "If schools were able to hire
more counselors, it would give them more time with the students. For every 75
students there should be one counselor... The schools should have it so there
would be only about eighteen students in a class. That way, you get more
one-on-one time with your teachers. A smaller class gives the teacher
a chance to get to know their students and then they might be able to notice if
something is not right. The students even have a chance to get to know each
other."
Another student observed: "The answer is not putting metal detectors in
every doorway. The answer is not banning all violent games. The answer is not as
easy as that... I mourn for this country as we try to open up our eyes and see
that everything isn't okay, and that each one of us is responsible. I
mourn."
The common thread of the impersonality of bigness runs through many of these
excellent essays. The bigness has its cause in two obvious things: the first is
population growth in our communities, and the second is the belief in the
economies of scale that are alleged to result from making our schools,
especially our high schools, larger and larger.
For many in the community, population growth is synonymous with the
"healthy economy." And, as they have said so frequently, our community
leaders are determined to maintain a "healthy economy." It has been
amply demonstrated that their continuing success will mean larger schools,
larger classes, less personal attention for students, and, predictably, more
problems.
As for the alleged economies of scale in large schools vs. small schools, we
need to look not only at the bottom line of the financial managers, but we need
to look at the real bottom line, the community outcome. I believe people are
beginning seriously to question the conventional wisdom about the efficacy of
bigger schools.
This collection of essays by teenagers in the Camera opened with the headline
question, "Is the deck stacked against America's youth having a peaceful
future?" If we continue our commitment to a "healthy economy" as
it is presently perceived and defined, the answer almost certainly is YES.
The annual loss of a few students and teachers is a small price to pay for the
continued annual growth of the Gross Local Product.
______
*
Used with permission of the author.
This is a slightly lengthened version of a Guest Editorial published
in the Boulder Daily Camera, (Boulder, Colorado) June 26, 1999, Pg. 11A.
