PSS using assertive discipline to cope with large class sizes

Assertive discipline.

That’s how the Public School System is coping with the record number of students it has this school year, according to Education Commissioner Dr. Rita A. Sablan.

Sablan disclosed that PSS has about 11,300 students in all schools on three islands as of last week, which is a 4- to 5-percent increase from last school year’s.

That has resulted in larger class sizes, particularly in big schools such as Marianas High School and Hopwood Junior High School, where classroom sizes range up to 32 students for every teacher. The bigger classes are evident in 4th to 12th grades.

Sablan said the increased class size is a direct result of the limited budget and resources allotted for PSS this year. Since PSS cannot hire more teachers, it will have to do with bigger class sizes, she said.

The local government has allocated just $30 million for PSS in fiscal year 2012. To cope with the lower budget, PSS restructured and reduced its personnel count to protect the classroom teacher positions.

That also means that classroom teachers are more challenged on how they will ensure that learning continues to take place even in the bigger schools. That’s where the assertive discipline approach comes in.

Saipan Tribune learned that assertive discipline is an approach to classroom management that involves a high level of teacher control in the class. This approach means that teachers must establish rules and directions that clearly define the limits of acceptable and unacceptable student behavior, teach these rules and directions, and ask for assistance from parents and/or administrators when support is needed in handling the behavior of students. The underlying goal of assertive discipline is to allow teachers to engage students in the learning process uninterrupted by students’ misbehavior, based on studies.

“Prior to the opening of the school year, we’ve been working with our principals on their staffing patterns and we have given them enough advisories on the potential shortfall of our budget for next fiscal year. As early as February, our teachers have been informed that when they come back to school they may have bigger class sizes, or more than 26 students per classroom. So one of the things that we worked with our principals this summer was really on assertive discipline and classroom management [to effectively handle bigger classes],” Sablan said.

In addition, she said a lot of instructional strategies have also been implemented to help students become engaged in classroom instruction. “I am hoping that our teachers are implementing those things,” she said.

Sablan hopes that the current situation of large class sizes is temporary and vowed to look for other ways to address this concern.

Marianas High School has over 1,500 enrollees this school year, a big jump from last year’s, according to acting principal Cherlyn Cabrera. With only 47 classroom teachers, the school’s teacher-to-student ratio is at 1:33-way higher than the 28 students allowed for secondary school.

Saipan Southern High School has over 900 enrollees and has a teacher-to-student ratio of 1:29.

Hopwood Junior High School’s enrollment is at 1,280; its teacher-to-student ratio is 1:32.