North America - Pupil-teacher ratio, secondary

Pupil-teacher ratio, secondary in North America was 14.94 as of 2018. Its highest value over the past 47 years was 20.70 in 1972, while its lowest value was 14.12 in 2010.

Definition: Secondary school pupil-teacher ratio is the average number of pupils per teacher in secondary school.

Source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics (http://uis.unesco.org/)

See also:

Year Value
1971 20.70
1972 20.70
1973 20.48
1974 20.25
1975 20.02
1976 19.79
1977 19.56
1978 19.33
1979 19.09
1980 18.87
1981 18.63
1982 18.40
1983 18.16
1984 17.90
1985 17.37
1986 17.10
1987 16.84
1988 16.56
1989 16.33
1990 16.08
1991 15.81
1992 15.59
1993 15.74
1994 15.91
1995 15.70
1996 15.70
1997 15.60
1998 15.49
1999 15.24
2000 14.94
2001 15.45
2002 15.19
2003 15.22
2004 15.27
2005 15.24
2006 14.94
2007 14.89
2008 14.71
2009 14.32
2010 14.12
2011 14.81
2012 15.00
2013 15.02
2014 15.10
2015 15.01
2016 14.98
2017 14.94
2018 14.94

Development Relevance: The pupil-teacher ratio is often used to compare the quality of schooling across countries, but it is often weakly related to student learning and quality of education.

Limitations and Exceptions: The comparability of pupil-teacher ratios across countries is affected by the definition of teachers and by differences in class size by grade and in the number of hours taught, as well as the different practices countries employ such as part-time teachers, school shifts, and multi-grade classes. Moreover, the underlying enrollment levels are subject to a variety of reporting errors.

Other Notes: Data retrieved via API in March 2019. For detailed information on the observation level (e.g. National Estimation, UIS Estimation, or Category not applicable), please visit UIS.Stat (http://data.uis.unesco.org/).

Statistical Concept and Methodology: Pupil-teacher ratio is calculated by dividing the number of students at the specified level of education by the number of teachers at the same level of education. Data on education are collected by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics from official responses to its annual education survey. All the data are mapped to the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) to ensure the comparability of education programs at the international level. The current version was formally adopted by UNESCO Member States in 2011. The reference years reflect the school year for which the data are presented. In some countries the school year spans two calendar years (for example, from September 2010 to June 2011); in these cases the reference year refers to the year in which the school year ended (2011 in the example).

Aggregation method: Weighted average

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Education Indicators

Sub-Topic: Inputs