Firm Conducts School Poll

Cambridge Public School Committee members raised several concerns at a meeting last night about a long-anticipated survey intended to address the causes of declining enrollment across the school system.

The survey, conducted by Opinion Dynamics Corp., a market research firm based in Cambridge, will be carried out in two phases. In the first phase, the research firm will form 10 focus groups, consisting of teachers, parents with children in the system, parents who have withdrawn their children from the system, and parents with children enrolled in private schools. The other phase will be a random telephone survey of 400 Cantabrigians.

Declining enrollment has plagued the city’s schools over the past decade. In the 1995-1996 school year, the school system boasted a total enrollment of 7,988. By the 2002-2003 school year—the last year for which there is available data—enrollment had fallen to 6,994, according to the Department Of Cambridge Community Development website.

While the committee said that they were excited to see the polling underway, many raised concerns about the methodology of the survey.

“You’re kind of set up for the active parent who understands the system and is ready to have their say,” said Mayor Kenneth E. Reeves ’72. “A lot of our parents aren’t like that.”

Also, Student School Committee member Tsion Girum, a junior at Cambridge Rindge and Latin, said she was worried about the lack of student voice in the survey.

“I have a sister who chose to attend private school and I chose to attend public school and our parents didn’t really have any input in our decisions,” she said. “It seems like you’re doing a parent survey when really parents don’t have that much time to be looking at things in-depth like this.”

Ernie Paicopolos, a consultant for the research firm, said that it was precisely this input that would make the survey most beneficial for the system. He said he would substitute one of the parent focus groups with a focus group of high school students.

“Those are exactly the kinds of comments that we want to solicit from you,” he told the meeting.

The first focus group will be conducted on Oct. 11.

—Staff writer Laura A. Moore can be reached at lamoore@fas.harvard.edu.