Top 10 US States by K-12 Student-Teacher Ratio (NCES)
PlainSchools ranks US states and DC by average student-teacher ratio across all reporting K-12 public schools, drawn from the NCES Common Core of Data. Updated with each NCES data release; every figure links to the source state.
Research period:
Research question
Across the 51 US state and DC public school systems represented in the NCES Common Core of Data, which states carry the highest and lowest student-teacher staffing density?
Methodology
This ranking lists the average student-teacher ratio reported by U.S. states and DC in the NCES Common Core of Data, the federal census of public schools and districts. The figures are recomputed automatically each time NCES publishes a new release, so the page reflects the most recent data available, and nothing here is hand-entered.
Where NCES suppresses a value (for confidentiality, small sample size, or quality review), that record is left out of the ranking rather than shown as a zero, which would push low-information records ahead of others. Figures appear in the same units NCES publishes, and if NCES later revises a value the change appears here with the next release.
Every state in the table links to its full record, where you can check the underlying numbers against the official NCES source. We publish rankings straight from the data without editorial spin; if you believe a figure is wrong, the contact details in the footer reach us.
See the methodology page for source vintage and full details.
Top 10 US States by K-12 Student-Teacher Ratio (NCES)
Source: NCES Common Core of Data, updated with each release
The ranked top 10
The full ranked top 10, with every figure linked to its source record. Figures update with each NCES data release.
| # | State | Students per teacher | Schools | Enrollment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | California | 21.5 | 10,006 | 5,787,663 |
| 2 | Utah | 21.4 | 1,068 | 681,626 |
| 3 | Nevada | 20.5 | 742 | 480,464 |
| 4 | Ohio | 18.2 | 3,586 | 1,675,943 |
| 5 | Florida | 17.8 | 4,029 | 2,838,009 |
| 6 | Alabama | 17.7 | 1,369 | 746,604 |
| 7 | Oregon | 17.6 | 1,277 | 537,619 |
| 8 | Washington | 17.6 | 2,465 | 1,092,149 |
| 9 | Michigan | 17.5 | 3,399 | 1,376,868 |
| 10 | Idaho | 17.1 | 778 | 315,098 |
Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, NCES Common Core of Data (CCD), the federal census of US public schools and districts. Figures are updated with each NCES data release. U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, NCES Common Core of Data (CCD), the federal census of US public schools and districts. Figures are updated with each NCES data release.
Findings
Top entity in the ranking
The top-ranked record in this dataset is California, with a value of 21.5 on the Students per teacher column. The full top-10 set is rendered in the table above. Every value comes straight from the official NCES data; no number is hand-entered. When NCES publishes a revision, the ranking updates here with the next data release.
Distribution shape
The gap between the top-ranked record (21.5) and the 10th-ranked record (17.1) characterizes how concentrated the top of the distribution is. Where the top value is many multiples of the median value of the visible set, the population is highly concentrated: a small number of entities accumulate the bulk of the measured quantity. Where the top and bottom of the visible set are close together, the distribution is relatively flat across the top end. The full distribution beyond this top-10 cut is summarized in the aggregate context section below and explored in the linked entity profiles.
Aggregate context
Beyond the visible top-10, the linked entity profiles and the methodology page place this ranking in the context of the full population: how many records qualify in total and where the leaders sit relative to the typical value. Records with missing or zero values on the ranked measure are excluded so the comparison stays like-for-like.
Source provenance
The records in this ranking come from the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics, specifically the NCES Common Core of Data (CCD), the federal census of US public schools and districts. We publish the figures as NCES reports them and refresh them with each new release, so the page does not carry stale numbers. The methodology page lists the source, the data vintage, and how each figure is derived.
Why this ranking matters
Rankings like this one let a reader scan a population quickly and identify outliers, concentrations, and patterns that warrant deeper investigation. The detail pages linked from each entity in the table above give the full per-entity context: time-series history where available, related metrics, and links onward to the underlying source records. The methodology page explains how an entity earns inclusion in the dataset and how the ranking column is computed at the source.
What this analysis cannot tell us
Student-teacher ratio measures staffing density, not class size. Schools organize teacher time across pull-out interventions, department-level staffing, and specialist roles that make average class sizes larger than the ratio implies. NCES counts teachers as full-time-equivalent instructional staff, so schools relying on part-time specialists show denser ratios than the head-count would suggest. State averages weight each school by enrollment but mask within-state variation between urban, suburban, and rural districts. Ratios do not capture teacher experience, pay, or curriculum rigor, they are a staffing input measure, not an outcome measure. This ranking is not an endorsement of educational quality in any state.
Secondary cut from the same source
States with the lowest student-teacher ratio in NCES Common Core of Data
Sources
- U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data (CCD) - https://nces.ed.gov/ccd/
- NCES Digest of Education Statistics, https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/
Cite this analysis
PlainSchools. (2026). Top 10 US States by K-12 Student-Teacher Ratio (NCES). https://plainschools.com/research/top-states-by-student-teacher-ratio/