Did anyone go to school in really small U.S. school districts? Class 1A (Div II)

[Samm]

In the US, there are joint school districts, many in the American west, which house all K-12 in one building because there just aren't that many students in the whole district (rural).  The smallest student population ones get 1A classification for high school team sports, but I'm using 1A to designate small school districts in general.  Some of the 1A districts may have fewer than 40 high school students total within a district (not just within a school).  Did anyone go to a U.S. public school like this which housed K-12 with maybe 200-300 total enrollment?  What was it like?  Was it hard to accept outsiders? Was it uncomfortable to be the smartest one in the class or to get the best grade?   Or were your friends especially supportive or each other?  I would guess it was hard to organize high school team sports unless the district had co-ops going with other 1A districts.  I am interested in anyone's experience -- especially if you were a elementary or middle schooler in such a 'one room schoolhouse' where there were also high school seniors walking around.

[The Girls' Mom]

I did for one year (well, two really, but the second year we had a new school and we were spread out over two buildings.)  It was the best school I ever attended.  I started school as an 8th grader, and had absolutely no problems being accepted.  My brother was a 2nd grader.  Being SUCH a small school, you couldn't go unnoticed as a new kid.  The high schoolers were rather protective of the little ones, and there was actually very little bullying there.  The entire school was very close knit.  

They did have a decent basketball team...mostly because the school was blessed with several very good athletes.  Most of the teachers had family ties to the school and were very invested in their students.  Being a successful student was strongly encouraged.  

 

I went to a total of 4 different schools in high school, and I would have loved to have spent my entire 4 years at that school.

[MomtoCandJ]

Yup that would be where I grew up. 250 kids tops between 2 elementary schools and the middle/high school. One of the elementary schools is on an island and the other is on the main land with the middle/high school.

My brothers and I all graduated from there and my middle brother's children go there as well. It is hard being the "new kid" because you stick out like a sore thumb. I was the new kid in 2nd grade.

Once I went to "the main land" for 7th grade things evened out. It was easier for my brothers since they started there from the get go and both went to the main land for elementary since one had an IEP and the other needed speech.

[Shellydon]

Yes.  I attended such a school.  My class was the largest that had ever gone through the school to date with 25 students.  When I was freshman, the senior class had 4 students.  The entire school used the same gym, cafeteria and band hall.  I found it very, very difficult.  I moved in in mid-elementary and moved out as a sophomore.  The academics were weak and there was a huge drug and alcohol problem, not uncommon in very small towns.  In the years I was there, there were 7 suicides.  I moved at age 16 to a large school (4A) with a graduating class of 120.  It wasn't much better on the drug/alcohol front, but it was big enough that I was better able to find a group to connect with.  I graduated in the top 10% and went on to get a B.S. and M.S.    When I have returned on my small school for reunions, I have been ridiculed and teased for my college degrees.  The flip side is that is was very rural and I was able to raise livestock and horses and compete in horse shows for many years.  I loved that aspect and would not trade that experience.

[Samm]

Yes.  I attended such a school.  My class was the largest that had ever gone through the school to date with 25 students.  When I was freshman, the senior class had 4 students.  The entire school used the same gym, cafeteria and band hall.  I found it very, very difficult.  I moved in in mid-elementary and moved out as a sophomore.  The academics were weak and there was a huge drug and alcohol problem, not uncommon in very small towns.  In the years I was there, there were 7 suicides.  I moved at age 16 to a large school (4A) with a graduating class of 120.  It wasn't much better on the drug/alcohol front, but it was big enough that I was better able to find a group to connect with.  I graduated in the top 10% and went on to get a B.S. and M.S.    When I have returned on my small school for reunions, I have been ridiculed and teased for my college degrees.  The flip side is that is was very rural and I was able to raise livestock and horses and compete in horse shows for many years.  I loved that aspect and would not trade that experience.

Wow. Even if you entered as a 5yo kindergartner -- 7 suicides by the time you were 16!  That's terrible, and bizarre.  How could such a tiny school get away with substance abuse problems?  Were there young kids using, or being pushed to buy?  Were the teachers a part of it?  Boggles my mind.  Good to hear you got to where you wanted to be.

[Joyofsixreboot]

My son goes to a school like that. About 250 kids k-12. He fit in very easily and is well known. I think it would be easier to find your niche than a mega-school. They don't offer the breadth of choices a bigger school would but the basics are well done and the teacher knows who they need to push for more. It works for him YMMV

[shawthorne44]

Wow. Even if you entered as a 5yo kindergartner -- 7 suicides by the time you were 16!  That's terrible, and bizarre.  How could such a tiny school get away with substance abuse problems?  Were there young kids using, or being pushed to buy?  Were the teachers a part of it?  Boggles my mind.  Good to hear you got to where you wanted to be.

 

The theory I've heard is that kids are so bored they do drugs as an escape.  

[LucyStoner]

I have several friends who came to my high school from one. They were from a very small island with a 1 room school house and most of the kids ages 14+ boarded with their relatives on the mainland for stronger educational and social opportunities after grade 8. The high school I went to was very small (under 50 student per graduating class) and drew a quite progressive crowd so we were something of a destination for such families.

[City Mouse]

I currently live in such a school district, and my kids have attended. Our district has total enrollment of about 250 kids although some are out of district transfers and covers something like 30,000 square miles. There are two elementary/middle schools, one regular high school and a distric charter school that is about 1/2 out of district students. When my DD graduated there were 10 kids total graduating. The high school was very good for my DD in many ways (we moved here when she was 16 and a junior). While a bright and capable student, she was a bit of an underachiever and was just one of many at her previous rigorous big city charter school. In the small school she better able to find a place to belong and did better academically. She was the first bassoon player in the bad in over 25 yrs. She got to be manager of the track team and earned a letter for that something she never would have been able to do in the "big city" school. she was able to take lots of dual enrollment courses at the school's expense. Some were taught onsite by the HS teachers and some were taught by the CC instructors with a live video feed.

On the other hand, she is a bit quirky (think undiagnosed Aspergers) and did not really care that she did not have any close friends. Mostly, the other girls were all friendly. They encouraged her to run for Homecomming queen (all the senior girls ran), and they included her in their pre-prom activities. All the girls got together at one house to dress and do make-up.

She did feel slighted at the end of year awards dinner and at graduation because she was not recognized as much as the local kids even though she had earned a coule of big scholarships.

 

My DS had a much harder time with school. There are about 14-15 kids at kis grade level. He ws in 4th grade when we move in, and unbeknownst to me at the time, he came and upset the playground order by introducing a new game/toy that was popular in Houston but not here yet. This made him a target of the "kingpin" for the 4th grade which as still not gone away completely after 4 yrs and 2 yrs out of that school. His only friends have been the other "new" kids, and that new kid status seems to last a long time.

He had a very hard time in 5th grade due to this boy and an difficult teacher. I pulled him out after 5th grade and he attends one of the online charter schools now. He misses out on a lot of social activites now because everything is communicated through the school even if it is not school sponsored. He says he wants to try the local high school for 9th grade, I really hope it works out for him, but I dont know that it will.

[Tap]

In the US, there are joint school districts, many in the American west, which house all K-12 in one building because there just aren't that many students in the whole district (rural).  The smallest student population ones get 1A classification for high school team sports, but I'm using 1A to designate small school districts in general.  Some of the 1A districts may have fewer than 40 high school students total within a district (not just within a school).  Did anyone go to a U.S. public school like this which housed K-12 with maybe 200-300 total enrollment?  What was it like?  Was it hard to accept outsiders? Was it uncomfortable to be the smartest one in the class or to get the best grade?   Or were your friends especially supportive or each other?  I would guess it was hard to organize high school team sports unless the district had co-ops going with other 1A districts.  I am interested in anyone's experience -- especially if you were a elementary or middle schooler in such a 'one room schoolhouse' where there were also high school seniors walking around.

I went to a school that had just over 100 students k-12.  The last year I was there had 12 graduating seniors.

DD16 went to a school with under 100 students k-8, and then a private school with K-12.  

DD8 goes to to a school with under 100 in 2-12.

 

They all handled things the same as any other school. It was just like any other school except at drop off and pick up.  Up until 6th/7th grade kids stayed in one classroom except for art/recess.  8-12 moved between classes.  You knew everyone and pretty much had the same kids in every class.  The class rotations were at different times, so young students, middle school and high school didn't really see each other much.  

 

In my school, sports programs were small and they had one sport per season per gender. I think it was volley ball (girls), track, basketball(boys), golf and maybe swimming.  Anyone who wanted to play a sport played and got game time. You got a PE credit for playing a sport so in the Entire middle school/high school there were only 8 kids in the PE class (I was the only

girl).  My school wasn't known for a good sports program because it was very rural and kids didn't play on private teams. 

 

DD's private K-12 school had several sports per gender per season.  They were known for their sports program and their teams did very well.  The vast majority of kids were on private teams as well as the school team, so there were some very seasoned athletes on the teams.

 

Outsiders we welcomed because they were new and novel at all the schools.

 

Friends were supportive because most of them grew up together and went to the same school year after year. 

 

 

I went to high school in some major cities too so I have done private, rural, and innercity.  The all pretty much operated the same except the private schools generally had more freedom since they operated outside of the school districts perview.

[City Mouse]

Wow. Even if you entered as a 5yo kindergartner -- 7 suicides by the time you were 16! That's terrible, and bizarre. How could such a tiny school get away with substance abuse problems? Were there young kids using, or being pushed to buy? Were the teachers a part of it? Boggles my mind. Good to hear you got to where you wanted to be.

In our community, drug problems are overlooked because the most important thing is to protect your own (family, relatives, community) over any outsider that includes how your community would be perceived by outsiders or portrtrayed by outsiders in he media. The local police chief suggest doing (legal in our state) drug testing of high school athletes, but one prominent coach refuses because there would not be enough left for a team. This coach is also related to the HS principal, so you can guess wholes opinion carries more weight.

[mommymilkies]

I'm not sure mine counts.  It only went up to 4th grade because after that they shipped everyone to the nearest town with higher grades.  They just didn't have the funding, space, or teachers for over that.  Our school had one class per grade and no doors-all open to the middle which was the "library".  I LOVED it.  It really felt like a community, and personal.  I would consider allowing my kids to go to that school if we lived there still. Um, I was an outsider from the "big city"-literally, but everyone thought that was very cool and they were very accepting.  I don't recall any bullies at that school (unlike my next school), and everyone got along pretty well. There were certainly no sports outside of PE, but most were farm kids who didn't have time, anyway.

[alisoncooks]

I grew up in an area like this.

My graduating class was 44.  There was one other high school in the county, but it was part of a K-12 and it was on an island.  They had very small class sizes, obviously.

 

It was rare to have any new faces.  Most of the people in the area had been there generations.  We seldom had new families move into the area, simply because there were no jobs to be found (most people had a family farm or fishing business).   

I remember feeling like the "cliques" that were in television/movies didn't exist so strongly in such a small school.  I was a jock...but I was also in art club...and a brain...and a band nerd.  With being so small, most kids were active in many different areas (less competition, less time commitment?)  IDK.

 

Our county was surrounded by other rural counties.  There were several 1A teams that we played in sports, mostly traveling about 1 hr. to get there (unless we played the island or another beach team, then it was either a 3 hr drive or 3 hr ferry ride).

[Mergath]

I did in eighth grade. There were something like ten students in my grade. I hated it. There was one catty girl who pretty much ran things, and she didn't like new kids. There were three of us she chose to ostracize, and it was a nightmare. The sad thing is that I had tried this school to get away from the bullying in my old school. It didn't work.

[klmama]

1A school here, too, with 250-300 students in K-12.  We had separate buildings for elementary, middle, and high school, but all were next door to each other.  P.E. and fine arts teachers taught everyone, and everyone used the same lunch room.  I did not notice any particular kindness from older students toward the younger ones unless they were relatives or the younger siblings of friends. 

 

High school sports were a huge part of the community.  Our school had football, baseball, softball, basketball, volleyball, golf, track and field, tennis, and wrestling.  Our conference was spread out over an enormous area, though.  I remember riding in the team bus about two hours to get to the farthest school we played against for games or meets. 

 

There was a local college, and the community valued higher education.  In my graduating class, 25 of the 30 kids went on to college.  Basically, most parents who were college-educated sent their kids to college; those who weren't, didn't. 

 

Was it hard to be one of the smartest kids in a high school with so few kids?  There was a lot of competition both academically and athletically.  We knew our class ranking from 6th grade on because the top kids compared grades on everything.  Being accepted by the lower-ranked kids wasn't terribly hard, though.  Really, that had less to do with intelligence and more to do with attitude and social skills.  Kindness and confidence go a long way, KWIM?  I think it was harder for boys with poor social skills than it was for girls. 

 

New kids were accepted differently by different people.  Again, attitude made a difference. The less mature and/or insecure kids resented them if they were "better" in some way, while the more mature and confident ones were often delighted to have new friends.  It was easier on kids who "fit" with the kids in their classes.  Sometimes the fit was just off, and it took until high school with the mixed-age classes for people to discover their tribe.

 

One plus of being in a smaller school is that kids have the opportunity to try more activities. Kids could be involved in something all the time, if they wanted to be. 

 

 

 

 

 

[Scarlett]

My mom taught in a school like that. 120 kids k-12.

[Liz CA]

My son attended a public school in which the upper enrollment number hovered around 85 for the entire school. Several classes were combined. Every teacher knew every child even if he/she had not taught that class level. My son knew the 4th grade teacher while he was still in 1st grade because this teacher often played ball with the kids during recess.

We loved it....but the school was constantly in danger of being closed. Every summer we would not know if there was a school come September. We eventually started homeschooling and when the school was closed down a year or two later concerned parents transformed it into a charter school.

There were not school teams other than unofficial impromptu games organized during recesses or after school.

[2squared]

I graduated valedictorian of a class of 42 from a town of 1500.  My brother graduated as valedictorian a year after me from a slightly larger class.  I loved attending a small school, but I was intelligent, athletic, and generally popular.  I was able to join every club in school and play varsity sports.  My brother struggled socially a little, but my parents had him skip a grade.  Looking back now, my parents wouldn't make the same decision.  He struggled with being the youngest and smallest pretty much his whole childhood, but he found like-minded friends in college.  I didn't know of any alcohol or drug problems in our small town.

 

When we stopped homeschooling, we looked for a small school environment for our kids, and we landed in a rural town of 1400.  My middle three attend a parochial school with class sizes of 10-14 kids.  My rising 8th grader has 41 kids in her public school class.  Our schools are small, but they are mighty.  Last school year our varsity teams brought home two state championships, and most of the other sports went to state.  We have two-three sports/gender per season, but many of the sports are co-op with a school the same size.  We wouldn't have to co-op if we offered fewer sports.  This year my 8th grader will be on the varsity Dance Line team.  I'm sure she wouldn't be dancing at this level in a larger school.  In a larger school she might not even make the jr. high team much less varsity!  My boys are being watched by the varsity coaches, and they are still pretty young.  Our academics aren't where I want them to be, but I don't know that the school size is the reason.  I just have high standards.  Our school offers quite a few AP classes, and we have a 4yr university 15 miles away.  I expect my rising 6th grader to be a FT college student his senior year of high school.  Access to the university is one of the reasons we picked this town to live in.

 

We moved here 1.5 years ago, and my kids have completed two school years in their schools.  My oldest did not do well in the parochial school so we moved her to the public school last year, and the public school has been perfect for her.  My rising 6th grader has struggled with one boy in his class, and we are closely monitoring his situation.  He is likely to be at the public school for 7th grade.  My younger two are doing really well at the parochial school, and my youngest will start Kinder there in 2016.

 

I love living in a small community.  My kids can pretty much come and go as they please, well except the 4yo.  He has to have big sibs with him when he leaves our yard, but he does play outside by himself.  Other kids constantly stop by looking for pick-up games at the park.  My oldest four go to the local pool by themselves and meet up with their friends.  All the kids from 1st-8th grades know my 4yo.  Living in a small community has been a great environment to give my kids wings and freedom yet natural boundaries where everyone knows everyone. 

 

ETA: The community is very family friendly since most people are related and all the kids know their friends' siblings.  My rising 3rd grader hangs with his older brother's friends, and no one thinks twice about it.  11yo boys knock on our door looking for either boy.  My 13yo takes my 4yo to the pool and meets up with her friends who are taking their little sibs to the pool.  My kids have recess together, eat lunch together, and pass each other in the hallways at school.  They go on field trips together, sing the same choir songs, participate in the same school events.  I love talking about our day at the dinner table, and the kids share the same stories and experiences despite being in different classrooms.

[Anne in CA]

I attended such a school. In my day we were B league and our football team played 8 man football and our girls basketball team only had six girls one year. It was JV/ Varsity, lol. I did not have a good experience, but my sister did. Likewise, one of my brothers had a great experience and one did not. I switched schools for my JR SR year and went to a much larger school in a neighboring town. Being the only girl in my class off and on since kindy was wearing me out. The class ahead of me was tight knit and the girls would not allow me to join them for anything. The girls in the class below me would allow me to join but were sometimes not nice about it, and I could never know when that would be. The class below that contained the nastiest humans know to man at the time, lol. They were all quite put out when I changed schools, though. I didn't care a bit. I changed schools, made new friends that I am still friends with and never looked back.

 

The pluses for the small school were that teachers who were passionate really got to teach. I didn't have many of them, but the three I did were REALLY amazing. The sports teams were so small that every kid who wanted one could earn a varsity letter. The enrichment activities were very meaningful with much smaller groups.

 

The minuses were that if you ever become an outsider social redemption is absolutely, completely impossible, you could be stuck with bad teachers/ coaches multiple years, the town bigwigs run the whole school and their kids are much more important than anyone else's.

[staceyobu]

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[plansrme]

I was valedictorian of my class of 11.  Do I win a prize?  I tell people now that  being valedictorian just meant that I was the smartest of a bunch of really stupid people, if that tells you anything about my experience.  This was a private Christian school.  Others may have had better experiences there, of course, but I am not in touch with anyone from my high school and don't really know what they think about it in hindsight.  I didn't love it at the time, but my disdain for the school really came into its own when I got to college and saw how much better other people's experiences had been.  

[FaithManor]

I did not attend one but we have a district here that is close to that small. Two buildings for prek through twelve and class sizes that run from 10-24. By adding prek they have enough students to be a class D school. The environment seems to be relaxed and well managed, but the academics at the late middle school and high school level are very poor. They have one part-time foreign language teacher so two years of Spanish is all that is offered. There is one music teacher - band instructor - who teaches general music grades 5 and 6 until band starts in grade 7 and he is only part time so the music program is very poor. They only have a math teacher through algebra 2, trigonometry is offered online through K12, and the only AP offered is English. Even their best students struggle to get into college because without a good CC nearby for dual enrollment, the kids have a very lackluster transcript and not enough other opportunities to shore it up.

 

There are parents who do not live in the district who send their kids there due to the lack of discipline problems, but it is a bad idea. The employment numbers as well as statistics for college and trade school bound students are super, scary low.

 

We do have a two room schoolhouse K-8 in the county northeast of us. High school students attend a consolidated facility about 20 miles away. Those kids seem to be getting a great education and are AlWAYS the top students in the larger high school where more opportunities abound. The teaching jobs at the K8 old fashioned school are highly sought after. When there is a rare opening - usually due to retirement - the parent/school board receives thousands of applications. It is a rigorous, time consuming process to weed that down to a small, manageable group of candidates.

[FaithManor]

I was valedictorian of my class of 11. Do I win a prize? I tell people now that being valedictorian just meant that I was the smartest of a bunch of really stupid people, if that tells you anything about my experience. This was a private Christian school. Others may have had better experiences there, of course, but I am not in touch with anyone from my high school and don't really know what they think about it in hindsight. I didn't love it at the time, but my disdain for the school really came into its own when I got to college and saw how much better other people's experiences had been.

This was my experience at a private Christian school that was fundamentalist. Catty, back stabbing, mean spirited, and celebrants of ignorance. I was an academically driven individual so highly ostracized by both students and faculty as wanting too much book learning was apparently "of the devil". I did not last long there and have nothing to do with the former students despite the fact many live in this community.

 

I think the greatest drawbacks of tiny schools can be lack of variety of interest making it hard to find like minded people to befriend and academics if the community is not pro-education.

[DoubleAMom]

I went to this type of school in rural Missouri.  We were k-12 all in one building.  I attended K there and then 3-12th grade.  I really don't remember too many people moving in, but plenty of people moved away.  I started high school with 33 people in my class, and we graduated with 22.  The other 11 either moved away or dropped out.  If a new family were to move in, I would guess they would be met with suspicion, especially if they were from a city. 

 

There were some things I loved about going to such a small school, and some things that I despised.  When I was younger, I loved seeing my big brothers in the halls.  When I was older, I hated how everyone knew everything.  Gossip was rampant and often strayed far from the truth.  I wrecked my car one weekend on a Sunday on the way to church.  When I got back to school on Tuesday the story going around was that I was out partying and driving drunk.  Another negative, once you had a reputation there was no getting rid of it.  The families from my town had all lived there for many generations.  If your family had a "bad" name, there was no escaping it, you were labeled the same.  Or if you were a "trouble maker" in elementary school, that label would follow you all the way through high school because all the teachers knew everything that was going on with all the kids (Only one teacher lounge and gossip was rampant there, as well.)  On the other hand, if you were from a "good" family or labeled a "good" kid, that reputation could take you a long way. 

 

I felt like the academics at my school were good, especially for the size.  It offered AP science courses, and if a student was interested in an advanced course that the school didn't offer, they would try to get it via video or correspondence.  Because the school was so small, there were fewer kids to compete with for scholarship opportunities.  I was able to attend the University of Missouri completely free on scholarship.  Also, since the school was so small, anyone could play sports, cheerlead or march in the band--there were no tryouts.     My school didn't offer a variety of sports, but we did have baseball, softball, basketball, and track.  We played other small 1A schools in our conference for sports.

 

It seemed like the school was divided between the kids who played sports (the "in" crowd) and those who didn't.  There wasn't really a division among academic-types and non-academic types as most of the smarter kids also played sports, which gave them an automatic bid to the popular crowd.  The major downside, I think, to growing up in such a small place is that there was nothing to do, so there was lots of drinking and causing trouble.  When I was in school drugs were not a problem, but I did hear that several years after my class graduated that drug usage had increased greatly.  I also heard that farmers and the farm store were being frequently robbed of fertilizer for people to use to make meth.  Those stories could be part of the proliferate rumor mill or could be accurate, I haven't been back to verify.

[Ottakee]

I went to a small 3 room Christian school k-8. We had 66 students in the school. My class was the largest ever with 12. The class ahead of us was 3 and the one behind us 1-2. It was a 3 room school.

 

From there I went to a highschool of almost 800. The first day of school I had 6 different teachers when in my previous 9 years of school I had only 3 teachers. Bug culture shock.

[Ottakee]

I went to a small 3 room Christian school k-8. We had 66 students in the school. My class was the largest ever with 12. The class ahead of us was 3 and the one behind us 1-2. It was a 3 room school.

 

From there I went to a highschool of almost 800. The first day of school I had 6 different teachers when in my previous 9 years of school I had only 3 teachers. Big culture shock.

[xixstar]

I spent one year at a school that had about 300 students K-12th. There were two buildings for all the grades. We had about 15-20 students in my grade .

 

I rember it was the start of the G&T program so I guess about 3rd grade. I recall it being a friendly school but I was shy. I had only one friend but that was the case at every school I attended. I also remember that I felt like I read every book in the library -- probably wasn't exactly true but I probably read everything near my grade level.

 

I remember playing basketball but not as a travel team. The only extracurricular I remember was FFA, but I was also a kid. The town had a one-pump gas station and a tiny little video rental store. Otherwise it was an hour to a bigger town.

It also took an hour to get to school on the bus because there were on a couple busses for everyone and we all lived spaced out.

[Samm]

Did many of the ultra tiny student body school combine grades?  Like 1st/2nd and 3rd/4th, and so on?