Set on concrete pillars, covered by wooden siding, the structure is held to the ground by metal straps so that it doesn't shake on a windy day. When it rains, they emerge one at a time beneath unfurling umbrellas, resembling little paratroopers descending onto the grass. They are soldiers of a sort, on the front line of America's new battle of the bulge, where too many students are overwhelming too few classrooms. The fight is about space and money and civic pride and, sometimes, education. In many schools, the art room has been turned into a regular classroom, replaced by art on a cart with an itinerant teacher.
Music is taught in the gymnasium or the cafeteria, and the library doubles as a classroom.
Known variously as portables, relocatables and modulars, these classrooms anchored in schoolyards across the country are not only America's favorite quick fix for overflowing schools, but also the physical symbol of the problem. Evesham Township, a middle-class Burlington County suburb 19 miles east of Philadelphia, is emblematic of many districts in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the rest of America. The township's student population has soared, thanks to the baby boom echo, a good academic reputation and eager developers. Coming into a bond-issue vote last December, the township district had tried and failed in 1996 and 1997 to win voter approval for a new elementary school. Around the country, school districts have suffered from antitax and anti-public education backlashes as they've tried to raise money for new or enlarged buildings.