Counting the number of empty seats in the Broward school district could be as difficult as sitting through an Advanced Placement calculus class.

``It's kind of complicated,'' district construction chief Michael Garretson said. ``And like all bad things, it started in Tallahassee.''

At a workshop meeting Tuesday, School Board members said the way the state counts empty seats is bloated. That measure says Broward will have about 33,000 more seats than students by the 2013-14 school year -- a number the district said would be lower if empty seats were counted differently.

``That's so unfair for us as a School Board, to get beat up constantly about the empty seats,'' said Robin Bartleman. ``That's not the truth. That's not the reality.''

The Florida Department of Education has told the district it cannot use state money to build any new schools or classroom additions because it has more seats than students to fill them.

Some Broward schools have too few students and some have too many. The halt to construction means the board faces the thorny problem of having to shuffle students from overcrowded schools to underenrolled ones.

PIONEER MIDDLE

Board members are already getting heat for a planned boundary change this year involving Pioneer Middle School in Cooper City, which would move hundreds of students east to Hollywood.

The board wants to avoid massive attendance boundary changes to other schools.

It has asked Broward cities and the county to loosen how they calculate overcrowding, partly by counting portable classrooms as part of a school's permanent capacity.

But board members don't think portable classrooms should count toward the number of empty seats in the district because of Broward's long-term goal to get rid of portables.

If the district's 2,100 portables are not counted, the number of empty seats would drop to about 15,000 this school year, district staff said.

The board also said the count overstates the number of empty seats because it includes how many kids can be in a classroom -- and not how many should be there.

For example, a classroom for autistic kids could accommodate 22, but ideally should only have about 10.

``You can't put that many [autistic] kids in a room,'' Bartleman said. ``The empty seats are not really empty seats.''

Added Superintendent Jim Notter: ``You've got to have overcapacity. . .Otherwise, you can't run this place.''

OVERCROWDING

Although enrollment figures began to dip slightly in the 2005-06 school year, some schools -- especially those in southwest Broward -- were still overcrowded.

And the district did not know how much it would have to build to comply with the state's class-size reduction amendment, which is supposed to take effect next school year.

Notter also pointed to a charter school boom in the past few years.

Charters enroll 20,000 students who otherwise would likely be in traditional public schools.

``We didn't have the kind of predictor that we needed to show that accelerated growth,'' Notter said.

The state recently denied a request from the district to build more classrooms at several middle and high schools in southwest Broward that the district considers overcrowded.

(The state did sign off on turning a new elementary school in Hollywood set to open next year into a K-8.)

Also on Tuesday:

• Kevin Tynan was sworn in to replace suspended board member Beverly Gallagher, who was arrested in September as part of a federal corruption probe

• Ten-year district audit committee member Charlotte Greenbarg learned from a reporter that board chairwoman Maureen Dinnen would not be reappointing her to the post.

Dinnen, who eventually spoke to Greenbarg in person, said she wants ``a fresh set of eyes'' and is considering picking a certified public accountant.

Greenbarg, a vocal critic of the board, blamed losing her position to ruffling too many feathers.

``That's a warning to other audit committee members,'' she said.

``Keep your mouth shut.''

Join the discussion

The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere in the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from profanity, hate speech, personal comments and remarks that are off point. In order to post comments, you must be a registered user of MiamiHerald.com. Your username will show along with the comments you post. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.

     Showing: Oldest first Newest first Most-recommended first Least-recommended first

@Nyx.AuthorDisplayName@ wrote on @Nyx.PostedAtTime@:

@Nyx.repliedToText@

@Nyx.replyAnswerText@

Reply to this Comment @Nyx.Recommender@ @Nyx.AbuseReporter@