Dearborn Parent Speaks Out on Education Cuts

Dearborn resident and parent of three Emily Champoux told her family’s story at . Her main complaint: class size.

Champoux’s son Henry is set to enter kindergarten next year, but he may not be able to join his older siblings, who are currently in the second and third grade, at .

“This year at DuVall, the kindergarten class size is 28 per class, and they’ve said they can only have one teacher until it hits 30–they can’t get an assistant, they can’t get any kind of help,” Champoux said. “My youngest son gets very over-stimulated if he’s in a room with too many kids, too much noise. It really sets him off–either he’ll withdraw or he’ll lash out.”

She added that she and her husband tried to put Henry in DuVall’s preschool this year, but ended up sending him to the ’s program because he couldn’t handle the class size at DuVall. Teachers did not have the time to give him the individual attention he needed.

Now, Champoux said, they’re facing the prospect of spending thousands of dollars a year to send Henry to a private school with smaller class sizes.

“If we’re looking at class sizes as they are now and then they might go up, he’s never going to be able to go to the regular school system,” she said.

Champoux said wasn’t sure how to fight back against her family’s predicament until she realized that schools’ growing class sizes were due to a lack of funding, which means less teachers.

“I couldn’t really focus my feelings about the cuts until started thinking about Henry,” she said. “Once I started thinking about his particular situation, I figured out, ‘This is where I feel wrong.’”

Champoux said she planned to write a letter to send to Gov. Snyder, as well as to travel to Lansing to participate in upcoming protests.

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