The long-term outlook is bleaker.
Although more students enrolled in four- and two-year colleges, small school alumni did not complete community college in greater numbers than the comparison group. After six years, about 10 percent of students had earned an associate’s degree, about the same proportion as students who did not attend small schools. The researchers also found no differences in employment or income.
There was one notable exception. Students who enrolled in four-year colleges were more likely to complete a bachelor’s degree if they had attended a small high school. Nearly 15 percent of small school students earned a four-year degree in six years, compared to 12 percent of their peers.
Joel Klein was New York City schools chancellor from 2002 to 2011 during reform. Klein said the data shows the small school’s effort was worth it. He considers it one of his most important achievements, along with the expansion of charter schools. Closing large high schools and replacing them with new ones required significant political will, he said, when it drew resistance from the teachers union. Teachers were not guaranteed employment at the new, smaller schools and had to reapply or find another school to hire them.
New York wasn’t the only city to try small schools. Baltimore and Oakland, California, among others, also used money from the Gates Foundation to experiment with the concept. He results They were not encouraging.
Klein responded that other cities failed to replicate New York’s success because they simply divided large schools into smaller units without building new cultures. In New York, aspiring principals submitted detailed proposals, as did charter schools, and schools opened gradually, adding one grade at a time.
There were unintended consequences in New York, too. During the transition years between the closure of the old school and the slow development of the new small schools, places were limited. Registrations in the remaining large schools in the city he rose. While some students enjoyed the intimacy of the new small schools, many more suffered from overcrowding.
Whether due to political resistance, replication challenges, or shifting philanthropic priorities, the small schools movement ultimately failed. In the 2010s, would-be reformers had focused their attention on evaluating teacher effectiveness and school turnaround strategies.
Today, when enrollment is declining in many districts, school consolidation, not expansion, dominates the conversation. MDRC’s Unterman said some districts are now exploring whether elements of the small school model (advisory systems or “schools within schools”) can be recreated within larger campuses.
By all indications, New York City’s small schools represented a vast improvement over the founding schools they replaced. Most are still in operation, which demonstrates their staying power. However, the evidence they leave behind also underscores a hard truth. Improving high school can achieve important milestones, such as getting more students to college. Changing students’ economic trajectories may require a more radical change.
This story about small high schools was produced by The Hechinger Reportan independent, nonprofit news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Jill Barshay Test points and others Hechinger Newsletters.
