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Snapshot
An interdisciplinary team of teachers shares a few hundred (or fewer) students in common. The team takes responsibility for the students’ educational progress, provides instruction for a large part of their instructional day in a physical space devoted to this purpose, and exercises maximum flexibility to act on knowledge of students’ needs.
- M-DCPS currently has three Smaller Learning Communities grants.
- M-DCPS has been awarded $30 million to support school redesign in Cohort 2005 (10 schools), cohort 2006 (10 schools) and 2008 (8 schools).
About
Funded by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Elementary and Secondary Education and Office of Vocational and Adult Education, the Smaller Learning Communities Program is a $142 million competitive federal grant program to plan, implement or expand smaller learning communities in large high schools. The goal is to have no more than 600 students in a learning community. Miami-Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS) applied on behalf of a group of six high schools in 2004, an additional ten high schools in 2005, ten high schools in 2006 and eight in 2008. The initial six schools were funded for a three-year grant cycle, and the other 20 were funded for five years.
According to the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Elementary and Secondary Education and Office of Vocational and Adult Education publication on Smaller Learning Communities (Washington, D.C., 2005, retrieved online August 31, 2005 at http://www.ed.gov/programs/slcp/applicant.html), grantees are authorized to use their funds to, among other things:
- Study the feasibility of creating smaller learning communities;
- Research, develop, and implement strategies for creating smaller learning communities;
- Provide professional development for school staff in the teaching methods that would be used in the smaller learning community;
- Develop and implement strategies to include parents, business representatives, community-based organizations, and other community members in the activities of the smaller learning communities. Strategies may include creating schools within schools, career academies, restructuring the school day, instituting personal adult advocates, developing teacher advisory systems and other innovations designed to create a more personalized high school experience for students and improve student achievement and performance.
Making high schools smaller is not a panacea for secondary education, but smaller, more personalized learning structures provide fertile soil for other high school improvement strategies to take root and succeed. Because change is easier to implement in a smaller setting, smaller learning environments create a context hospitable to reform. In fact, research suggests that smaller learning environments at the secondary level reap the following benefits:
- Smaller learning environments are a condition for boosting student achievement.
- Smaller school size has positive effects on student outcomes as evidenced by students' attendance rates, frequency of disciplinary actions, school loyalty, reduced use of alcohol or drugs, satisfaction with school and self-esteem.
- An effective size for secondary schools is in the range of 400-800 students.
- Enrollment size has a stronger effect on learning in schools with large concentrations of poor and minority children.
- Research ultimately confirms what parents intuitively believe: that smaller schools are safer and more productive because students feel less alienated, more nurtured and more connected to caring adults; and teachers feel that they have more opportunity to get to know and support their students.
- Small school environments positively affect student achievement with noted improvements in grades, test scores, attendance rates, graduation rates, reduced drug and alcohol use, and school safety.
- There is also evidence that large high schools that have been restructured into smaller learning communities yield similar benefits, especially when the sub-school units are separate and distinct.
Primary Contact for Smaller Learning Communities: Dr. Lupe Diaz, Director, Schools of Choice, 305 995-2636, lupediaz@dadeschools.net. |
