Public school--district size?

notreallyirish · February 2014

One of the negative things about the school district I live in is that it is enormous population-wise and geographically. I was curious about district sizes elsewhere. How many students are in your district? What's the area? How many districts in your metro area or county?

There is just one district for my entire city. It serves close to 100,000 students and 400 square miles. You can't pick your school and don't necessarilly get placed near your home, so your kid could be bussed 20 miles across town. Not a great setup for numerous reasons.

eaglesfan700 · February 2014

From K-12, our district has about 5500 students

bhuffman · February 2014

Our school system K-12 is about 5900 students.

brachysira · February 2014

Our district has 3400 students--6 elementary schools, 1 middle school, and 1 high school. We live adjacent to larger city and there are six or so school districts in nearby communities commonly sought after because of their less urban qualities, including ours. But 1/5 of students in our district are from "schools of choice" which allows students who live outside the district to attend our school if they apply and there is space in the 1/5 of room allowed for these people.

The busing in your district sounds nightmarish. There aren't magnet schools or other ways to choose? What is nice about larger districts is that there are usually magnets and more programs in general, with more competitive curriculum and more diverse activities. If there are no honors classes or anything that may not be the case for you. However, growing up, people from the sticks would sometimes transfer to our school and they knew nothing. It was like they thought the were the smartest, but with only 20 people in their grade, and only 2 sports, they just didn't have to try too much. To that end, I wouldn't automatically choose a very small district over a decent large one. Your situation sounds tough tho.

Andrewsgal · February 2014

Our district has a little over 14,000 students, 22 school and covers 245 sq miles we are the second fastest growing district in the state so only getting bigger. We are adding three new schools next year and two more the year following including a 350 million dollar high school.

eaglesfan700 · February 2014

LalaMama81 said:

Straight from the SD's site: The C School District serves a population of nearly 37,000 residents in a 9 square mile area. Like the Township, the School District is highly diverse with an ethnic student body population consisting of 50% African American, 38% Caucasian, 7% Asian, 4% Hispanic, and 1% other races. The District operates four K-4 elementary schools, one 5-6 elementary school, one 7-8 middle school, and one high school, serving 4,499 students total. There are 39,000 people in our township. We are in a county adjacent to Philadelphia with 25+ school districts. It's 400,000 square miles and I think around 900,000 people.

Lol, the wiki link I saw mentioned our school district, yours, UD and LM as the "inner ring" of Phila suburban school districts

penguingrrl · February 2014

My school district serves my 2.5 square mile town. There's one elementary school and one middle school. Our HS is a regional HS and the HS itself is its own separate district.

The preK-8 district has about 900 students, the HS has about 1100, including 3 main districts plus magnet programs in the arts that bring students there from all over the county.

jnksmom · February 2014

Out district covers our entire city. It has 89 schools and services about 60,000 students. We are in desperate need of 2 new middle schools as some of ours are over capacity but that may be a few more years.

hokies94 · February 2014

Ours has 23,000 students in 26 square miles. 22 elementary, 5 middle and 5 high schools. It's pretty compact area wise. Unless you go to a magnet school, the bus rides are not that long. My kids' bus ride is 1.5 miles and takes about 10-15 min. I'm right outside of DC in VA. There are 6-7 counties nearby in VA that have their own school systems.

notreallyirish · February 2014

brachysira said:
Our district has 3400 students--6 elementary schools, 1 middle school, and 1 high school. We live adjacent to larger city and there are six or so school districts in nearby communities commonly sought after because of their less urban qualities, including ours. But 1/5 of students in our district are from "schools of choice" which allows students who live outside the district to attend our school if they apply and there is space in the 1/5 of room allowed for these people.

The busing in your district sounds nightmarish. There aren't magnet schools or other ways to choose? What is nice about larger districts is that there are usually magnets and more programs in general, with more competitive curriculum and more diverse activities. If there are no honors classes or anything that may not be the case for you. However, growing up, people from the sticks would sometimes transfer to our school and they knew nothing. It was like they thought the were the smartest, but with only 20 people in their grade, and only 2 sports, they just didn't have to try too much. To that end, I wouldn't automatically choose a very small district over a decent large one. Your situation sounds tough tho.

There are some magnets, but you have to apply. Your child's school assignment is weighted based on your address and the economic, educational and racial data of your zip code measured against the data for he rest of the grade. It makes the district incredibly diverse which is a really positive factor, but on the practical end, kids can end up far away from home AND siblings do not get assigned to the same school unless the math works that way.

penguingrrl · February 2014

MrsMuq said:

Our district covers 5 towns and has an enrollment of roughly 15,000 annually. We have 2 high schools, 4 middle schools and 12 K-5 schools. DS elementary school and middle school are within 3 miles of our house, and the high school is less than 5 miles. All students are bussed, even if you live next door to the school.

Why would you ride a bus if you live that close? We bus fewer than 5% (only 1 bus to the elementary, none to the middle school), so I'm confused. Why wouldn't kids withing 1/2 mile walk or bike?

NCMichelle · February 2014

Ours serves about 54,900 students. The school system has 43 elementary schools, 13 middle schools and 14 high schools. Eleven special schools bring the systemwide total to 8

Kneeknee · February 2014

We live in a rural area. The district is pretty large but it's mostly farms with a couple tiny towns.
Our district serves 834 students and comprises one elementary school (K-5), one middle school (6-8), and one high school(9-12).

ToastieSimons · February 2014

Our district in 19.1 sq miles. We have 5 elementary schools, 1 middle and 1 high. It serves about 4300 students.

ToastieSimons · February 2014

penguingrrl said:

MrsMuq said:

Our district covers 5 towns and has an enrollment of roughly 15,000 annually. We have 2 high schools, 4 middle schools and 12 K-5 schools. DS elementary school and middle school are within 3 miles of our house, and the high school is less than 5 miles. All students are bussed, even if you live next door to the school.

Why would you ride a bus if you live that close? We bus fewer than 5% (only 1 bus to the elementary, none to the middle school), so I'm confused. Why wouldn't kids withing 1/2 mile walk or bike?

We weren't allowed to walk or bike because there were no sidewalks. So throughout my entire schooling we had to be bused even though I only lived .5 mi from the school. Now, they put sidewalks in, even though they don't cover the entire area and you have to pay for busing separately. However, if I wanted to walk to the local elementary I would have to walk on a very windy narrow road with no sidewalks or shoulder. The one side is a very steep wooded downhill and the other side is a very steep wooded uphill so there isn't even anywhere to really go to get out of the way.

penguingrrl · February 2014

ToastieSimons said:

penguingrrl said:

MrsMuq said:

Our district covers 5 towns and has an enrollment of roughly 15,000 annually. We have 2 high schools, 4 middle schools and 12 K-5 schools. DS elementary school and middle school are within 3 miles of our house, and the high school is less than 5 miles. All students are bussed, even if you live next door to the school.

Why would you ride a bus if you live that close? We bus fewer than 5% (only 1 bus to the elementary, none to the middle school), so I'm confused. Why wouldn't kids withing 1/2 mile walk or bike?

We weren't allowed to walk or bike because there were no sidewalks. So throughout my entire schooling we had to be bused even though I only lived .5 mi from the school. Now, they put sidewalks in, even though they don't cover the entire area and you have to pay for busing separately. However, if I wanted to walk to the local elementary I would have to walk on a very windy narrow road with no sidewalks or shoulder. The one side is a very steep wooded downhill and the other side is a very steep wooded uphill so there isn't even anywhere to really go to get out of the way.

Ah, that makes sense. Being bused is just so far from my experience that I forget other areas don't have sidewalks, etc. I was never eligible for a school bus. In NJ you must either be 2 miles away (pretty much impossible in my town) or need to cross a major highway (there is not one in my town) in order to be bused. I forget that in other areas busing is standard!

notkateanymore · February 2014

20k residents, 4500 students, 12.5 sq miles.

That's 4 elementary schools, 1 Jr. High {7-9} and 1 HS {10-12}. Two thousand students spread evenly across the Jr High and High School...and the rest are at the elementary schools.

penguingrrl · February 2014

LalaMama81 said:

penguingrrl said:

ToastieSimons said:

penguingrrl said:

MrsMuq said:

Our district covers 5 towns and has an enrollment of roughly 15,000 annually. We have 2 high schools, 4 middle schools and 12 K-5 schools. DS elementary school and middle school are within 3 miles of our house, and the high school is less than 5 miles. All students are bussed, even if you live next door to the school.

Why would you ride a bus if you live that close? We bus fewer than 5% (only 1 bus to the elementary, none to the middle school), so I'm confused. Why wouldn't kids withing 1/2 mile walk or bike?

We weren't allowed to walk or bike because there were no sidewalks. So throughout my entire schooling we had to be bused even though I only lived .5 mi from the school. Now, they put sidewalks in, even though they don't cover the entire area and you have to pay for busing separately. However, if I wanted to walk to the local elementary I would have to walk on a very windy narrow road with no sidewalks or shoulder. The one side is a very steep wooded downhill and the other side is a very steep wooded uphill so there isn't even anywhere to really go to get out of the way.

Ah, that makes sense. Being bused is just so far from my experience that I forget other areas don't have sidewalks, etc. I was never eligible for a school bus. In NJ you must either be 2 miles away (pretty much impossible in my town) or need to cross a major highway (there is not one in my town) in order to be bused. I forget that in other areas busing is standard!

I don't think it's a law - I lived maybe 3/4 mile and was bussed b/c of sidewalks mostly. My siblings were bussed to middle school and it was less than that, too. I don't think it was due to sidewalks, just very busy roads, not highways, not multi-lane, just busy.

Really? Because when I tried to get a doctors note for asthma in HS and was 1.98 miles they told me I was SOL because they weren't required by law to bus me!

penguingrrl · February 2014

LalaMama81 said:

penguingrrl said:

LalaMama81 said:

penguingrrl said:

ToastieSimons said:

penguingrrl said:

MrsMuq said:

Our district covers 5 towns and has an enrollment of roughly 15,000 annually. We have 2 high schools, 4 middle schools and 12 K-5 schools. DS elementary school and middle school are within 3 miles of our house, and the high school is less than 5 miles. All students are bussed, even if you live next door to the school.

Why would you ride a bus if you live that close? We bus fewer than 5% (only 1 bus to the elementary, none to the middle school), so I'm confused. Why wouldn't kids withing 1/2 mile walk or bike?

We weren't allowed to walk or bike because there were no sidewalks. So throughout my entire schooling we had to be bused even though I only lived .5 mi from the school. Now, they put sidewalks in, even though they don't cover the entire area and you have to pay for busing separately. However, if I wanted to walk to the local elementary I would have to walk on a very windy narrow road with no sidewalks or shoulder. The one side is a very steep wooded downhill and the other side is a very steep wooded uphill so there isn't even anywhere to really go to get out of the way.

Ah, that makes sense. Being bused is just so far from my experience that I forget other areas don't have sidewalks, etc. I was never eligible for a school bus. In NJ you must either be 2 miles away (pretty much impossible in my town) or need to cross a major highway (there is not one in my town) in order to be bused. I forget that in other areas busing is standard!

I don't think it's a law - I lived maybe 3/4 mile and was bussed b/c of sidewalks mostly. My siblings were bussed to middle school and it was less than that, too. I don't think it was due to sidewalks, just very busy roads, not highways, not multi-lane, just busy.

Really? Because when I tried to get a doctors note for asthma in HS and was 1.98 miles they told me I was SOL because they weren't required by law to bus me!

I don't know. I'm just assuming there's more to it than mileage & highways. Or they're individual town/county regs.

Or my HS sucked and lied, which is highly possible lol! I'm sure there's some rule about distance, sidewalks, heavily trafficked areas, etc that combined made it easier to say "2 miles" in my area where everywhere has sidewalks and there aren't big roads.

nosoup4u · February 2014

We're in Chicago - 400,000 students, just under 700 schools (500 or so are elementary). The system is so complicated w neighborhood, magnet, gifted, selective enrollment and charter schools it would take all night to explain. DS1 goes to a neighborhood school one neighborhood over from where we live.

The biggest district I went to as a kid currently has 4400 students, K-12.

pitterpatter129 · February 2014

I just copied/pasted from the district's webpage

"40,000 thousand students, 7,000 employees, 88 campuses, 250 school buses and about 173 square miles" Yes, it says the word thousand after 40,000 on their website. This explains test scores.

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