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Issue Paper SnapshotSchool Size |
After World War II, the number of schools in the U.S. declined by 70 percent and their average size increased fivefold. This trend seems to have peaked. Today, there is a growing realization that bigger schools are not necessarily better. Education researchers and the public now believe that students have better opportunities to succeed in smaller schools.
Talking Issues
- Research has continually found that small schools are superior to large schools on most measures and equal to them on the rest.
- Larger schools and school consolidation may be more economical initially. But long-term costs are higher because larger schools have lower levels of student achievement, more safety and discipline problems, and lower rates of attendance and graduation.
- Research varies on what is the most effective size for a school. Some researchers believe an elementary school should be between 300-400 students.
- In some large urban areas, districts have been successful at physically and organizationally subdividing large schools into smaller autonomous schools in the same building. While not ideal, it presents an option.
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