High schools will bear brunt of district’s growth

Terry Webster

Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2000 | 11:20 a.m.

Nevada's student enrollment led the nation in the past decade, rising 66.9 percent, but the state is expected to lose that distinction in the coming 10 years.

However, it may gain a new claim to fame: the greatest growth of high school graduates.

Those estimates were released Monday in Henderson as U.S. Education Secretary Richard Riley picked the Clark County School District, the nation's sixth largest, in which to unveil a national report on overcrowded schools.

Nationwide, 53 million children will be in elementary or secondary schools this year, according to the report, released during Riley's visit to Foothill High School and at a press conference in Washington.

Nevada's enrollment is expected to grow 11.9 percent by 2010, a forecast surpassed by Idaho, with 14.1 percent, and New Mexico, at 12.1 percent.

But Nevada is expected to lead the nation in the growth of high school graduates, Riley said.

That will be part of a nationwide record increase in the number of high school graduates and a corresponding rise in college enrollment, which hit 15.1 million this year and is expected to grow 19 percent by 2010, the report said.

Nevada already has the unsavory distinction of leading the nation with a 9 percent high school dropout rate.

Most of Nevada's growth stems from the Clark County School District, which almost doubled from 1988 to 1998.

The school district's population is expected to top 231,000 this year. In the coming year about 18,300 children will enter first grade, the largest number of students enrolled in any grade.

Experts say nationwide the increase is a result of the "baby boom echo," the expanding birth rate that started in 1977, when millions of young adults born after World War II began to have their own families. Students entering school in the next 10 years will be the grandchildren of the baby boomers, as well as the children of the increasing number of immigrant families.

"There will be no breathing room," Deputy Education Secretary Frank Holleman in Washington. "The country cannot wait out this issue."

Despite an ambitious school construction program of about one new school per month, many Clark County schools are overflowing.

U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., who accompanied Riley to Foothill, cited Von Tobel Middle School as an example of the overcrowded conditions.

"When the school opened in 1965, there were a little over 900 students," she said. "Now there are over 1,700 students in 14 portables. No kid should be going to school in this day and age in a portable."

Riley said to address overcrowding, his department is backing a bipartisan plan to provide $24.8 billion nationally in school construction bonds, which would be interest free.

Bearing the brunt of the nation's overflowing schools are the teachers, including the 1,200 new teachers recently hired by the Clark County School District.

As many as 10.2 million additional teachers will be needed nationwide over the next 10 years, Holleman said.

Before a packed theater at Foothill High School in Henderson, Riley called Clark County's 1,200 new teachers "the patriots of America." "I thank you so much for being in education and being teachers," he told the crowd.

Riley noted that with the growth will come a changing population. Hispanics are expected to lead the population growth in the nation, increasing by 60 percent, from 7.9 million to 12.7 million.

Given that shift, Riley said, it's important for all school districts in the nation to design a program for non-English speaking students and to evaluate the effectiveness of the program and make changes where needed.

"We think it's a mistake to not do that," he said. "It's very important."

Riley called himself "a great believer in the standards movement."

"We are getting into that in Nevada," he said. "It deals with academic quality and it also deals with every aspect of education."

Clark County School Superintendent Carlos Garcia said he was pleased the district is receiving national attention.

"It's good to know he (Riley) knows that we're here and what we're going through," Garcia said.