Student/teacher ratio refers to the number of enrolled students in a school, program, or institute of higher education relative to the number of formally defined educators on staff. (At the postsecondary level, this ratio may also be referred to as student/faculty ratio.) For example, a school that has a student/teacher ratio of 20:1 has a head count of 20 students for each one teacher, although this ratio may not reflect typical class sizes. The relevance of this statistic for student outcomes is a matter of current academic and policy debate. Recent data from the National Center for Educational Statistics indicate that the national student/teacher ratio in the United States is 15.4:1. The states with the five highest student/teacher ratios are Utah (22.9:1), Arizona (20.8:1), Oregon ...