Pleasant Valley High School’s enrollment has steadily increased for years. There are currently over 1,700 students enrolled at the high school for the 2023-2024 school year, a number never reached before.
However, the number of classes offered and the teachers for those classes have not been able to keep up with the demands of such a large student body . Just this year, many students at Pleasant Valley High School were denied access to classes due to the large student population.
Even though accommodating every student’s class preferences is a huge task, it is certainly something that PV strives to achieve. However, teachers can only teach a certain number of classes per day, each holding only a certain number of students.
If a student is denied access to a Pleasant Valley High School class, there are other options. One of these options is dual enrollment classes, such as the ones offered by Scott Community College. However, these classes do not always accommodate all students’ needs.
Scott Community College classes often have much different prerequisites than their Pleasant Valley High School counterparts. “Sometimes what happens is a student signs up for my class and they’re good but they try and sign up for a Scott calculus class and they can’t meet the prerequisites,” said AP Calculus teacher Erik Belby. Over the summer Belby had students who were signed up for his AP Calculus class unable to take it even though his one AP Calculus period is not full. Many times this problem is due to unavoidable scheduling conflicts.
Despite differing prerequisites,some PV students were able to take Scott Community College classes to fill the role of other classes they were unable to take. “I was unable to take AP Calculus, which was my first choice, due to scheduling conflicts, but I was fortunate enough to be able to meet the prerequisites and obtain a spot in Scott’s calculus class,” said student Max Sorgenfry.
As Pleasant Valley High School’s student body is growing, it is placing a greater strain on the teachers and staff. Teachers are having to teach larger classes which leads to less personalized instruction. “What it’s boiling down to is that the school has more students but not enough new teachers,” remarked Belby.
Having a high student to teacher ratio can cause all sorts of problems for everyone in the school. It can make it harder for students to get into the classes they want, lead to less personalized instruction, and cause teachers to be overworked.
