Small Class Sizes are Better!

All parents know in their hearts that small classes offer the best environment for learning. That why at Fishburne we keep our student-teacher ratio at 6:1.

The benefits of small class size, especially in grades K-12, seem so obvious that you’d think everybody could agree on this idea. Actually, they don’t. Some school administrators argue in favor of large classes. That’s particularly true for people charged with running large public education systems. From an accounting standpoint, small classes are inefficient. A locality that wants to cut class size needs more classrooms and more teachers, and these costs more money.

Something interesting happens when observers stop looking at the dollars and focus on the students. When that happens, small becomes very attractive. Consider California’s experience. California decided to shrink classroom size. The results have been astonishing. According to a 2007 state report, teachers report overwhelmingly that reduced class size leads to increased – student attention, student class participation and academic performance. Teachers are able to spend more time with each student and instructional time is spent on instruction – not discipline.

Other reports show what commonsense suggests when it comes to this topic.

At Fishburne, we’re completely committed to small classes. Unlike gigantic public school systems, we’re not pressured to sacrifice the learning environment for the sake of financial efficiency. Instead, we can give all our attention to our students and to helping them develop the skills and confidence they’ll need in college.