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DoDEA Plan to Slash Kindergarten Aides Will Diminish Teaching Time Per Student

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Background Information from FEA:


DoDEA Proposal to Cut Kindergarten Aides



In a memo to DoDEA staff that became public in late April, DoDEA Director Dr. Shirley Miles stated her intention to change the way full day kindergarten (FDK) classes throughout DoDEA are staffed.

You can read that memo, along with Dr. Miles' memos on raising middle school class sizes and hiring 160 new "Resource Managers" at the Stars & Stripes Web site.

The current system uses a maximum Pupil to Teacher Ratio (PTR) of 29:1 to determine the number of kindergarten teachers per school. In addition, each FDK class is assigned a dedicated classroom aide to assist the teacher. Some of the many ways in which these aides provide assistance are listed below.

Under Dr. Miles proposal: the PTR for FDK classes would be changed to 18:1. This sounds like an improvement since it seems to reduce class sizes. However, Dr. Miles also dictates that classes that meet the 18:1 ratio will no longer have a classroom aide assigned exclusively to them. Instead, the kindergarten teachers will have to share an aide with one or more other kindergarten teachers. In effect, this means that DoDEA full day kindergarten classes will go from having two adults per 29 students (a 14.5 to 1 ratio) to one adult per 18 students, with the unreliable promise of one aide that has to split time between multiple classrooms.

Dr. Miles has tried to sell her plan as an improvement for education, saying DoDEA would hire 92 new kindergarten teachers to reach the 18:1 PTR. While more educators and smaller class sizes would be improvement, the 92 new teachers would be expected to cover more students, per person, than kindergarten teachers currently do and to do so without an aide much of the time.

Because having a classroom aide full-time in the classroom allows teachers to work with some students in small groups or individually, while the classroom aide works with the rest of the class on other projects, the result will be less individualized attention for each student. And because this will take place at the very beginning of the child's schooling, the negative impacts of this decrease in individual attention will be compounded throughout the rest of that child's life. Dr. Miles' plan is literally a recipe for decreasing academic achievement.

In addition, classroom aides help with numerous other tasks that are unique to a classroom full of 5 year olds who, often, are away from home for the first time. Some examples are:
  • Helping to calm unruly children so the teacher can continue working with the rest of the class. A roomful of kindergarteners will not wait patiently while the teacher tries to calm one student who is acting out.
  • Helping with common incidents such as bathroom accidents and taking sick children to the nurse; without a full-time aide the students would need to wait until the teacher could find someone to accompany the student or watch the class while the teacher took the student. Having an aide who can quickly and quietly help a student who has become sick or had a toileting problem saves the student much embarrassment and prevents distractions to the rest of the class.
  • Helping to supervise children during lunch breaks, recess, getting on and off school buses, and during assemblies. Kindergarteners are not familiar with such practices and expecting one adult to keep track of 18 five year olds in these situations is not realistic.
  • Monitoring the class in the event the teacher is called away temporarily.
  • Assisting the kindergarten teacher with countless tasks such as cleaning up supplies, making copies, setting up computers, reading to the class, copying materials, etc.
  • Accompanying teachers on visits to student's homes. Aides will frequently work with the students while the teacher meets with parents to review and discuss educational issues.

Polling by FEA in DoDEA schools indicates overwhelming support among kindergarten teachers for maintaining current sizes and the promise of one aide per classroom rather than switching to the promised 18:1 PTR with no dedicated aide. Feedback FEA has received indicates less than 10 percent of kindergarten teachers favor the change Dr. Miles wants to make.

Education experts such as the National Association for the Education of Young Children recommend a kindergarten PTR of no more than 12:1 As mentioned above, Dr. Miles' plan would actually increase the effect ratio of students to adults from 14.5:1 to 18:1.

In DoDEA's own Customer Satisfaction Survey for School Year 2008-2009, parents/sponsors and students were asked what change could be made to improve the quality of education at DoDEA schools. Of the options available (excluding "none of the above") "reducing class sizes" finished a close second to "raising academic standards" as the most important potential improvement. Despite this clear feedback from its stakeholders, DoDEA is now proposing to raise the PTR in middle schools and to effectively raise the PTR in kindergarten classes.

There is no budgetary necessity or educationally-sound reason for making this change. Dr. Miles has offered no rationale at all for her proposed cuts to staffing. The fact that she is simultaneously planning to hire 160 new "Resource Managers" (who will handle logistics duties already being covered by numerous administrators and employees, thereby making these positions completely unnecessary) lead to the conclusion that the staffing cuts are being made to pay for more administrative personnel.

Dr. Miles' plan will result in less individualized attention per student and more disruptions in kindergarten classrooms. It is a plan that is bad for kids and bad for the quality of education.

Update, June 3 2009
DoDEA announced today it would be lowering the classroom pupil-to-teacher ratio (PTR) in some kindergarten classrooms to the new 18:1 level for school year 2009-2010. Equally important, DoDEA has stated these classrooms will not lose their full-time aides for SY 09-10.
FEA welcomes this announcement (see FEA press release) but warns that the DoDEA statement makes no guarantee for full-time aides in kindergarten classrooms in School Year 2010-2011 or beyond.
At a June 10 meeting between FEA and DoDEA Headquarters staff, Dr. Miles told FEA that keeping the kindergarten aides in place will not be limited to the 2009-2010 school year.