Teacher-student ratios do matter

I'm glad for the Johnson GSAT Survey commissioned and published by The Gleaner. I have heard many sides to the story and am gladder for those still.

The opponents' major bone of contention is that a cohort of six students should not be stacked against a school with a cohort of, say, 50 or 100 students. Why not? Is a single-stream school with 25 students in a single class better off than a school with 100 students in four classes? The real debate is not about the size of the cohort but rather the teacher-student ratio.

On January 19, 2014, the Jamaica Observer ran an article titled 'Class sizes don't guarantee better results'. The article reported that it was the belief of a National Education Inspectorate (NEI) "that small classrooms equal better students is a myth". The article went on to name schools with high teacher-student ratios that do "exceptionally well" with larger classroom sizes.

But what does exceptionally well really mean? Exceptionally well is relative to region, expectations and standard. But the published numbers allow us to make our own evaluations. And based on my own assessment of the numbers presented and other information I have on teacher-student ratios of the top schools, all other things remaining constant, teacher-student ratios appear to matter.

AVAILABILITY OF RESOURCES

The one problem, of course, is that all other things simply do not remain constant in the real world. In fact, exactly the opposite is true, especially in light of scarce resources, great income disparities, and varying levels of education.

There is a strong likelihood that parents of prep-school children have somewhat more resources and are probably more directly involved with their children's learning. The drawback is that the survey attributed students' performance solely to schools.

With more resources, there is greater access to things like the booming extra-lessons industry, for example. Some extra-lesson programmes in Kingston involve up to 20 extra hours per week, or about two-thirds of a regular school week. This culture also varies greatly by parish.

It's not that urban schools are better, per se, but urban areas are more densely populated and so competition is fiercer than in rural areas. As with anything else, competition tends to raise the standards of performance. One way to improve performance is through additional hours of study. And I am willing to put my head on the block that children from the so-called top schools are receiving relatively more hours of tuition, and not necessarily from their school of enrolment.

The root problem is that there simply are not enough spaces in the higher-performing or traditional high schools, and this problem is exacerbated in urban areas. And until more spaces are created or high schools become more homogeneous, in terms of quality, there will always be some sort of a race to the top.

The survey is not perfect but I say 'yes' to any and every attempt to improve transparency and advance our system of education.

Andrena McMayo is a banker. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and aramsamugh@gmail.com.