As part of a broader plan to discuss
his education policy with the nation (and to shore up the
African-American vote, no doubt), Mitt Romney toured a West Philadelphia charter school and spoke at a round table with
teachers and educational leaders last week. Our Republican presidential nominee took the opportunity to tout his
educational reform mantra of parental choice, introducing plans for
voucher program that would use federal money to allow students to
attend various well-performing public, charter, and private schools.
Expounding upon his platform, Romney revealed that he does not consider class size to be a determining
factor in student performance. Rather, in line with his
anti-teacher-union strategy, Romney argued that the push to decrease
class size is merely a wasteful union ploy to hire more teachers.
While urban teachers everywhere, whose
intuition screams that this is false, pick their jaws off the floor,
I will concede two things that lend credence to the Republican
nominee: First, Romney's argument is logical, though
fundamentally incorrect. Secondly, Romney does cite specific
scientific studies that support his conclusion that class size has
minimal effect on student achievement.
On a personal level, even this is is
hard to admit. In my own experience as a teacher, I found classroom
size to be critical to classroom success. This principle was
eloquently articulated by Erin Thesing, who teaches at another West
Philadelphia charter school, on the Obama-Biden blog this week.
Thesing reasoned
that “at
the end of the day, smaller class sizes mean that there is more time
for small groups or individualized instruction, and that is game
changing for learning.”
However, putting this “anecdotal”
evidence aside, numerous studies, including that which Romney cited,
conclude the exact opposite: that class size does not play an
important part in student achievement. Plenty of classrooms across
the globe have classroom sizes that rival those of the U.S., yet show
academic progress at a much higher rate.
What is not recognized in these
studies, however, is that the influence of class-size as a variable
impacting student performance, is context-dependent. Whether or not
class size plays a critical role is dependent upon the particular
classroom, in a particular community, etc., etc.
