due to increased student:teacher ratios, I suspect they've gotten worse Class size seems to be the single biggest concern related to education quality. However

due to increased student:teacher ratios, I suspect they've gotten worse Class size seems to be the single biggest concern related to education quality. However, it's not entirely clear that smaller classes help; especially not that they help "normal" students (as opposed to those who are "at-risk"). It seems that other things being equal, this is can be a big help to those that need extra help, especially when they're not getting much support educationally at home. But it doesn't seem to have the same effect on kids that are doing OK anyway. Also, having smaller classes means having more teachers. And that means either offering much higher salaries or settling for less-good teachers. The latter is probably not helpful, and higher salaries may cost money that could deliver greater results when invested in other ways. Simply assuming that your kids will do better if the classes are smaller is erroneous. Read a bit more here: http://www.edweek.org/rc/issues/class-size/ http://www.edweek.org/rc/issues/class-size/