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 Back to Solutions: Concentrating Growth and Development
Reducing "School Sprawl"
 A familiar sight in communities across the country is that of a large educational facility with huge sports fields located far from the town or city center, serviced by a fleet of buses hauling school kids over miles of roads. How did this happen?
One factor has been the decades old belief -- now increasingly questioned -- that super-sized schools provide a better educational environment for students. Reinforcing this have been national and state new school facility standards which require high "acreage per pupil ratios" -- standards difficult to meet in other than remote locations. Finally, many communities have for too long failed to take into account the problems "school sprawl" can cause: increased public expenditures; isolation from the heart of the community; and increased auto useage and commuting time (for teachers and students). Evidence is mounting, however, that the tide has started to turn, as state and local efforts to reduce school sprawl have begun to take hold.
Edward McMahon, in an article titled "School Sprawl" (in the Summer 2000 issue of the Planning Commissioners Journal; read excerpts from the article which can be ordered & downloaded online) notes the important role that school facility standards have played in promoting super-size schools.
McMahon also discusses how several states have become to "change the rules to level the playing field." McMahon observes that: "In 1995, Maryland spent only 34 percent of its school construction budget on existing schools. This was because its funding formulas favored new schools. As a result of the state's 'Smart Growth Initiative,' the funding formulas were changed. In 1998, 84 percent of Maryland's school construction funding was being used for improvements to existing facilities."
Why Johnny Can't Walk to School is a report released in 2000 by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. According to National Trust President Richard Moe, "When the school anchors a neighborhood, both the students and residents benefit. The trend of building shopping mall sized schools outside town alienates students, encourages sprawl, and impairs our send of community. We can serve our students better by revitalizing our historic neighborhood schools. It's responsible, thoughtful, and fiscally sound."
The Sierra Club's report, Sprawl Costs Us All: How Your Taxes Fuel Suburban Sprawl documents some of the public costs associated with "school sprawl." For example, the report notes that: "Between 1970 and 1990, Minneapolis-St. Paul built 78 new schools in the outer suburbs and closed 162 schools in good condition located within city limits. ... In Maine, though the student population declined by 27,000 students, the state spent a whopping $727 million on new school construction." The report also gives examples of the large busing costs associated with school sprawl.
The Surface Transportation Policy Project has available on its web site an interesting 1999 report, High Mileage Moms, which notes that mothers with school aged children make an average of more than five car trips a day, 20 percent more than other women. The report says that far flung growth traps mothers behind the wheel of a car -- an average of 66 minutes a day spent chauffeuring children to school, soccer games, birthday parties, or grocery stores.
 It's not just K-12 schools that have contributed to school sprawl, so have many new public colleges and universities. But academic institutions, with some creativity, can locate in downtown districts. The University of Washington has helped revitalize downtown Tacoma by restoring a number of buildings and putting them to academic use. Click on the photo of the building above for a "then and now" tour of some of the historic buildings now part of the University of Washington. [Editor's note: Ed McMahon discusses this project in his "School Sprawl" article]. |
New Schools, Better Neighborhoods is a California-based organization focusing on ways of developing schools which are more closely integrated with the community -- and which do not contribute to increased sprawl and consumption of farmland. As noted on their excellent web site:
"The planning and design of more community-centered schools can enhance the principles of smart growth. By serving as a catalyst for inner-city development, the proper planning of schools can help by: 1) Creating magnets for urban development; 2) Encouraging the development of inner-city housing and employment opportunities; 3) Improving mobility; 4) Reducing suburban migration; 5) Conserving greenfields."
NSBN also has resources and links to information on how to strengthen the role school facilities can play as part of the broader community:
"New school facilities should be accessible -- day and night, all year round -- to the community. Schools should serve as a variety of community needs in partnership with a wide array of public, civic, and private organizations. Smarter designs for new or renovated school facilities can accommodate direct community access to spaces like libraries, gymnasiums, auditoriums, health clinics, athletic and recreational fields, and performing arts space."
A steadily growing body of academic research, however, has found that in most cases smaller schools, not bigger schools, yield better student performance:
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Kathleen Cotton, an educational research specialist at the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory in Portland, Oregon, notes that student achievement in small schools is at least equal and often superior to achievement in large schools, and that a large body of research in the affective and social realms points to the superiority of small schools. See Cotton, School Size, School Climate, and Student Performance
. See also, Cotton, Affective and Social Benefits of Small-Scale Schooling (ERIC Digest)
Among Cotton and others' research findings: students in small schools experience a much greater sense of belonging; student attendance rates are higher; students participate in extracurricular activities at significantly higher rates; and attitudes of students and teachers toward work are better.
Why is this the case? As Cotton explains: "People in small schools come to know and care about one another to a greater degree than is possible in large schools, and rates of parent involvement are higher. Small-school students tend to take more of the responsibility for their own learning, learning activities are more likely to be individualized, classes are typically smaller, and scheduling is much more flexible. ... Finally, small schools tend to exhibit greater emphasis on learning that is experiential and relevant to the world outside of school."
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Let's Build a Big-Box High School!
From a letter to the editor appearing in the January 6, 2002, Burlington (VT) Free Press: "Admiring as I do the magnificent planning which the town of Williston continually exhibits, might I take this opportunity to offer a solution to the town's current high school dilemma? Instead of arguing about prospective construction sites, why not simply locate Vermont's first big-box high school on Marshall Avenue, bucolically nested among Wal-Mart, Home Depot and Petsmart? Another nice, bright 100,000 square foot cube, 'Books 'N Stuff' High School will fit right in. And who doesn't love a sea of outdoor parking? ... Roy C. Towlen, Underhill, Vermont.
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