Temporary trailer classrooms have become more than a temporary solution for overcrowding in Montgomery County. During the last 10 years the number of portables used in the county’s schools has tripled, triggering a host of complaints from parents and neighborhood groups.
Last school year teachers taught about 14,000 Montgomery County pupils in 719 portable classrooms, the same total as the year before. Matters will improve somewhat when classes resume in the fall. The number of portables will drop to 606, mainly due to the opening of five new schools, according to Board of Education public information director Brian Edwards.
But even with the decrease, Drew Powell, executive director of the citizens group Neighbors for a Better Montgomery, calls the portable amount “still excessive.”
“I’m not saying we shouldn’t have any portables, but not 600 or 700,” said Powell, the father of two Montgomery County students. “When there are more kids in the portables here than in, say, Frederick County, it speaks to the fact that the infrastructure is not there.”
He said he believes the problem really hit a point of no return in 2003 when the county changed its growth policy to allow for approval of new development in any area until the schools in that area reached 110 percent of capacity.
That change opened up the doors to situations where more children were crammed into classrooms, leaving the problem of where to put the extra students.
Neighbors for a Better Montgomery has been working on the issue of temporary classrooms for five years, mainly he says, because of the potential health hazards raised nationally concerning mold in these units. The portable classrooms also take up valuable playground space.
“This is a reflection, as we see it, on our out-of-control growth policy,” Powell said. “The schools finally need to keep up with the pace of growth.”
However, according to Edwards, reduction of the number of portables is a high priority of Superintendent Jerry Weast, who brought up the problem six months ago.
The goal, he said, is to cut the number of portable classrooms in half the next five years. Nationally, 36 percent of schools use portables, with about half of these using the temporary classrooms to a great extent, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.
By the Numbers
Total classroom trailers used in Montgomery County schools year by year
» 1994-95 school year: 200
» 1995-96: 208
» 1996-97: 202
»1997-98: 210
» 1998-99: 233
» 1999-2000: 290
» 2000-01: 357
» 2001-02: 575
» 2002-03: 635
» 2003-04: 689
» 2004-05: 719
» 2005-06: 719
» 2006-07: 606 (expected)
Source: Montgomery County schools
