Does School District Size Matter for Equity?
Is the size of a school district critical in creating equity for students? The Community Schools Initiative of Nevada is seeking signatures for a ballot initiative that would allow cities and municipalities to opt-out of the county school district and form their own school districts. Currently school districts in Nevada are by county. Leaders of this initiative state that this is necessary because Nevada has “some of the largest school districts in the nation, and some of the worst.” Further they state that “Large school districts lose touch with their communities, waste money, and cannot fully or even adequately serve students, parents, families, and teachers.” These supporters believe that smaller school districts are more responsive to the communities they serve.
Last week I had the opportunity to attend a forum on the proposal. Board members from the Community Schools Initiative presented their reasons for the proposal and answered questions. There was a good deal of conversation about large school districts being trapped by bureaucracy that results in a failure to serve the needs of students. They believe that creating small school districts would result in better accountability and outcomes for students. It would create equity as Ms. Castor, one of the board members repeatedly stated.
This conversation got me to thinking, is the size of the school district a criteria for creating equity for students. If equity is defined as doing whatever it takes for each student to master rigorous grade level standards, does district size matter? That led me to noodling on how to rate school districts, a task that has been tried in a multitude of ways by others as well. If the purpose of schools is to educate children, their success in educating their students has to be a primary comparison.
As educators are acutely aware, comparing school districts or even schools is an almost impossible task. Every state uses different student outcome measures and has different graduation requirements making such basic comparisons like comparing apples and oranges. The fact that there is no common measure of student outcomes makes it very difficult to compare them or rank them by their success in ensuring their students are mastering rigorous grade level content.
After grappling with this question, I went back to the one set of measures that is consist across the country for students regardless of where they live and that is the NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress). These assessments, which are randomly administered to students in every state, allowing you to compare the performance of the education systems of each state by fourth grade and eighth grade scores in literacy, mathematics, and science. Most districts have no idea how their students are performing on this measure as all scores in a state are lumped together for a state wide score. However, some brave school districts in our larger population centers are now participating in a Trial of Urban Districts which allows the data by these specific districts to be published by district. This not only allows these districts to monitor their progress, as measured by NAEP, but to also compare their performance with other large districts.
Since Clark County School District (NV) was front and center in the conversation at this forum about the need for smaller districts to improve equity and/or student outcomes and they are participating in the Trial of Urban Districts, I reviewed their 2019 NAEP data. (That is the most recent complete data due to the disruption of the pandemic.) I looked at fourth grade and eighth grade mathematics and reading scores. In each of these areas there are large urban school districts that scored significantly above the national average. Miami-Dade School District is larger than Clark County and scored considerably above the national average.
Clark County School District (NV) was not one of the districts above the national average, but they were close to the national average and never near the bottom of the list. Now, this is not to say that Clark County School District (NV) does not need to improve their student outcomes. They do! They have way too many students who are not demonstrating proficiency in reading and mathematics. However, on this measure they were certainly not the worst as claimed in the forum.
So, how do you improve student outcomes in the Clark County School District or other large districts? Do you start by creating smaller districts? Maybe, however, I am not sure that dividing the district up into smaller districts by municipalities will create what most people would consider small districts.
If you look at the Census Bureau Quick Facts for July 2021 for North Las Vegas, Henderson, and Las Vegas (the three largest municipalities for Clark County, Nevada) you can see that based on population estimates for July 2021 that each of these cities would have a significant number of children of school age so that each of these ‘new’ districts would still be among some of the largest school districts in the country with North Las Vegas having 58,117 school age children, Henderson, 52,193 school age children, and Las Vegas with 112,541 school aged children.
It is worth noting, however, that the diversity of these districts would vary significantly. Using the same Census Bureau Quick Facts, the following population characteristics were found.
| North Las Vegas | Henderson | Las Vegas | |
| Persons in Poverty | 12.7% | 8.0% | 14.9% |
| White | 48.0% | 72.2% | 58.5% |
| Black | 21.9% | 6.0% | 12.1% |
| Asian | 6.6% | 8.7% | 6.7% |
| Hispanic/Latino | 41.4% | 17.3% | 33.2% |
| Persons with Bachelor’s degree | 17.2% | 34.0% | 25.2% |
The argument that small school districts equal better student outcomes and equity for students is not a sure bet. Equity is doing whatever it takes so that every student masters the rigorous grade level standards. This difficult work takes people who believe it can and must happen and then act to ensure every student does master rigorous standards. It is the culture and design of the school system that makes it happen, not the size.
Do the district’s educators insist that every child read on or above grade level by the end of third grade? Do the district’s educators insist that every child master grade level math and enter high school ready to master Algebra? Do the district’s educators insist that every student take advanced classes in high school so they are equipped to succeed in college or technical certification programs? Do the district’s educators refuse to accept excuses such as poverty, disability, language, home life, etc. as reasons that students cannot master rigorous content, but rather provide the supports to overcome these hurdles?
Not all small school districts excel in providing equity any more than large ones do. Despite this reality, I can certainly understand how having smaller districts might make it easier to dismantle an old district culture and the systems of deficit thinking and establish a new culture and systems needed to make equity happen. I have worked in urban and rural districts and in some of the nation’s largest school districts as well as small districts. There is certainly a risk of bureaucracy becoming a hurdle to creating school districts that deny equity to students. However, it is not a given.
What creates equity, and therefore high achievement for all students, are the educators, the people, that work every day in our districts, schools, and classrooms. It their beliefs and actions that either create or deny equity for our students. We must have schools and districts that are staffed by educators whose calling it is to ensure every single student masters the rigorous grade level standards and more.
This blog is written by Dr. GwenCarol Holmes, a long-time educator and passionate advocate for all students mastering rigorous standards.