CCSD expected to be fifth-largest U.S. district

Friday, Sept. 24, 2004 | 11:28 a.m.

Today's head count of Nevada's public school students is expected to make official what educators have been anticipating for months: Clark County is the nation's fifth-largest school district.

The Clark County School District had 280,444 students attending classes Thursday -- 8,044 more students than the public schools of Broward County, Fla.

Broward County, which includes the Fort Lauderdale area, had 272,400 students at its "count day" Sept. 17. That was more than 7,000 students shy of the Florida school system's own enrollment predictions.

As required by state statute, Clark County's count day is today. The results will be audited and given official status next month. The Nevada Department of Education uses count-day figures to determine district funding for the year.

No school district in the nation has experienced the explosive growth that Clark County has. The district's enrollment has grown between 4 percent and 7 percent for each of the past 10 years, with more than 25,000 new students added to the rosters since 2002.

The move into the top five is certain to renew debate over whether the Clark County School District is too large, said Keith Schwer, executive director of the Center for Economic Research at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

For years some lawmakers have been calling for the district to be broken up into geographic regions. The primary argument against such a move has been "econmony of scale," Schwer said.

"The idea is that bigger school districts are better able to purchase textbooks and outfit science labs than smaller districts," Schwer said. "The question now is whether Clark County (School District) has become so large that it is inefficient."

In many other states, including Michigan and Texas, there have been legal challenges to the inequities between schools in wealthier communities versus poorer, urban neighborhoods. That's been a fight Clark County has largely avoided in part because the single district is required to share its expenditures equally, Schwer said.

"What people have to do is weigh the relative benefit of efficiency against how effective the schools actually are at educating students," he said.

Agustin Orci, deputy superintendent of curriculum for the Clark County School District, smiled ruefully when told of the impending move from sixth to fifth place.

"I don't know at what point we're going to explode but we're getting close," Orci said. "How do you add 12,000 new students without increasing funding? We've managed to do more with less but that can't continue indefinitely. Let's hope as we go into the new legislative session people realize that fact."

New York City boasts the nation's largest school district with more than a million students. Los Angeles Unified is in second place, followed by Chicago and then Dade County, Fla., in the fourth-place slot.