With last week’s release of the annual Condition of Education Report, a few areas of note are available for viewing.
Students
Student numbers have continued their climb, increasing for the 7th year in a row. The number of students last year reached 486,264. This is up 9,245 from 10 years ago and up 12,771 from the lowest number in the 10-year span (2010/11).
Teachers
Teacher numbers have continued to climb as well, to meet the student demand. 10 years ago the number of teachers in the state was at 34,744. The latest number is 37,035, an increase of 2,291. During that period, however, teacher numbers dipped even lower to 33,916. Today’s numbers are 3,119 above that low-water mark.
Student/Teacher Ratio
Both teachers and student numbers have increased, but has the teacher number kept up? Yes. The overall teacher/student ratio has decreased to another low. It reached 13.13 students per every teacher, down from 13.73 10 years ago and 13.96 at its highest point (2010/11).
Salaries
Salaries for teachers have continued to climb as well. Last year saw an increase to $58,765. This is up from $49,664 10 years ago, an increase of $9,101. For rankings nationally we held steady at 22nd in the nation and 5th in the Midwest. 22nd is not only the lowest in this 10 year span, but also by far the lowest over the past 2 decades. We reached 40th in the nation in 2005/06.
Class Size
While a few stats above looked at teacher/student ratio, that doesn’t actually show classroom size. It just compares the total number of students to the total number of teachers. Class size information is kept only for grades K-3 and efforts to reduce those numbers are helped by supplemental funding each year of over $30 million, started in 2008. Since that funding began, we are at our lowest numbers in this period: 19.5 students in Kindergarten, 20.0 in 1st grade, 20.6 in 2nd, and 21.3 in 3rd.
These stats and many more can be found in the 2018 Condition of Education Report: https://educateiowa.gov/sites/files/ed/documents/2018ConditionOfEducation.pdf
2018 Annual Condition of Community College Report Available
The Department of Education last week released the annual Condition of Iowa’s Community Colleges report. It includes data on programs and services, student enrollment and demographics, student success and completion, college costs and affordability, instructional staff salaries and characteristics, and financial information. The report also includes success stories that illustrate how community colleges impact Iowans and the economy.
Some of the highlights, pointed out by the Department:
- 131,144: The number of students enrolled in community college credit courses, down slightly from 132,694 the year before. It’s down from 141,226 in 2014.
- 51,001: The number of jointly enrolled students who earned college credit while in high school, up from 49,868 the year before. Jointly enrolled high school students account for 38.8 percent of total community college enrollees and 24.1 percent of total credits.
- 22.4%: The percent of community college enrollment from racial and ethnic minority groups, which represents a record high.
- 16,747: The number of credit awards earned (associate degrees, certificates and diplomas), down from 18,115 the previous year.
- 26,005: The number of noncredit program awards, up from 19,261 the year before. The majority of these awards (69.2 percent) were industry-awarded credentials designed to lead to or enhance employment opportunities.
In addition to the Condition of Iowa’s Community Colleges report, disaggregated data tables and interactive data visualization tools are available on the Publications webpage of the Department’s website.
Both can be found on the Department’s website: https://educateiowa.gov/adult-career-and-community-college/publications
