Fewer students, bigger classes. The contradictory trend had parents and teachers in Prince George’s County voicing their concerns at a school board hearing Thursday night. The hearing on Superintendent William Hite’s proposed FY2012 budget drew a crowd with standing room only at the Sasscer Administration Building, to address an additional $85.7 million in budget cuts.

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It’s projected that from FY2011 to FY2012, the schools will lose 1,840 students for an overall enrollment of 124,833. Declining enrollment combined with a loss of federal stimulus dollars and further cuts from the state have led Hite to propose bigger class sizes as a way to save $20 million.

Hite revised his proposed FY2012 budget, originally introduced in December, after learning of $20.8 million in cuts from Gov. Martin O’Malley last week.

“I believe anything that deals with class size and cutting teaching is not good for our children,” said Rita Harper, who has four grandchildren attending Prince George’s County Public Schools.

More than 50 percent of the proposed cuts will have a direct impact on the classroom.

Among the most contentious of the cuts: eliminating more than a thousand staff and teaching positions in Prince George's County Public Schools.

“Your decisions over the next few weeks could be devastating to the lives of our employees, erode the academic gains we made and dismantle any hope we all had of pulling this district out of corrective action,” Prince George’s County Education Association Executive Director Lew Robinson said while addressing the board.

Robinson offered the school board his recommendations for how to cut the budget without staff cuts or furloughs:

The school board will host public hearings on the budget on Feb. 8 and 10, and will vote on he budget on Feb. 24.