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How many students can fit into each of the Warsaw elementary schools?
The capacity of the schools depends on whom you ask.
At the March 15 Warsaw school board meeting, board member Ron Yeiter released figures showing that all remaining elementary schools (Madison, Eisenhower, Washington, Harrison, Leesburg, Jefferson and Lincoln) will be over capacity after the three small schools close and their students move into Warsaw schools.
Yeiter said his figures on school capacity were based on the information released four years ago by the Community Based Planning Project.
Those figures, however, are not the same as the capacities released by Warsaw Community Schools in the Oct. 15, 2001, proposal for the current building project at the administration building and Warsaw Community High School.
And those numbers don't totally agree with what the individual school principals say is the capacity of their schools.
Take Washington Elementary, for example. The CBPP capacity for Washington, according to Yeiter, was 365 students. The WCS figure, according to the Oct. 15, 2001, proposal, was 493. And Tom Ray, Washington principal, says his school's capacity is 555.
So what's the real capacity? Or is there even a fixed number for school building capacity?
According to Dr. Dave McGuire, superintendent, "The only numbers we have are the ones in the 2001 study, and we know that's wrong."
He added: "Anytime you change the use of a room or change the assumptions, that changes the capacity." If a music room is converted to a classroom, he said, that would add to the capacity of the school by approximately 25, the number of students in the classroom.
One way to figure school capacity, McGuire said, is to calculate the number of classrooms assigned to specific grades and multiply that by the maximum number of students allowed by Indiana's Prime Time program per classroom in those grades.
Prime Time stipulates that there be a maximum of 18 students per teacher in kindergarten and grade one, 20 in grades two and three and 25 in grades four through six.
Using those figures, and using Washington again as an example: Washington next year expects three kindergarten classes (3 x 18 = 54), four first grade classes (4 x 18 = 72), four second grades (4 x 20 = 80), four third grades (80), three fourth grades 3 x 25 = 75), three fifth grades (75) and four sixth grades (4 x 25 = 100). By those numbers, Washington's capacity is 536 students.
Since the numbers of students in individual grades changes annually, the school's capacity also changes yearly using that formula.
Mike Wilson, Warsaw Fire Department fire marshal, said each school building originally was built with a specific number of students in mind and each building has a maximum occupancy, which, he said, applies to the number of bodies in the school, whether they're adults or children.
To arrive at that maximum occupancy, however, Wilson would need to look at the architect's plans for each building and divide the square footage of each classroom by a predetermined factor.
The formula for maximum occupancy differs for gyms, libraries and classrooms.
The state has no records on school capacities, and Warsaw's building and planning department depends on WCS administration to furnish that information.
