The brain-to-hands ratio

One of the most challenging aspects of designing college classes in the United States is that our society does not adequately invest in education. The painful reality is that, in the absences of larger expenditures in schools that require substantial legislative changes, modern day educators are forced to search for “quick” and “inexpensive” solutions to very complex problems. In this post I define the brain-to-hands ratio which is a comparison between the number of school employees and number of students served by that school.

Let’s start our work by borrowing some terminology from the culture of war. In US military jargon, the tooth-to-tail ratio is a measure of the number of non-fighting military personnel (tail) used to support an individual combat soldier (tooth). Historically, this ratio has fluctuated in the different US combat operations. But, in the modern day United States military, it is not inaccurate to say that this ratio falls somewhere between 2:1 and 7:1.

For the purposes of this discussion, let’s suppose this ratio is 4:1, meaning that for every one troop on the ground, the US military dedicates 4 full-time non-fighting support troops whose job it is to handle all the logistics required to support that individual infantry soldier. This ratio would immediately imply that the US government recognizes that in order to create a highly effective fighting force, each individual soldier needs a team of dedicated noncombat workers whose job centers on making it possible for that soldier to fight.

Now, let’s transfer the ideas behind this quantitative measurement from the realm of military service into the realm of education. Specifically, let’s define an brain-to-hands ratio as a measure of the number of school employees (the hands) used to support an individual learner (the brain).

Imagine, for a minute, that we lived in a society that had enough wealth and political will to guarantee that this brain-to-hands ratio was 4:1. Or, put another way, imagine if we invested in education at the same rate we do in military action so that every student had four dedicated professionals working around the clock on their behalf to support the process of learning.

Is there any doubt that such a robust system of support would lead to an educational utopia?

For each individual student, we might be able to create customized curriculum based on that student’s academic interests and personal needs. We might also be able to ensure that all the external logistics required for education (food, transportation, housing, finances, supplies, health care, emotions support, etc) were provided free-of-charge by this robust support network. In this fantasy world, the learner would need only to show up and dedicate her best effort to the task of learning. All other aspects of the learning environment would be curated and maintained by the learning support team.

I would bet that in this case, college educators would be able to invest substantial resources getting to know each individual student. In doing so, we could then create student-centered and socially-conscious learning environments. When done well, these student-teacher relationships would likely empower each student to reflect deeply on their lived experience, think creatively about how to contribute to society, and leverage their education to strengthen their immediate communities.

As you might recognize, this thought experiment represents a fantasy world. In reality, my classroom feature a brain-to-hands ratio of 1:40, meaning that one faculty member (me) is responsible for supporting 40 individual learners. Moreover, my full-time status demands that I teach 3 classes per term. Which implies, I serve 120 students per academic quarter and 360 students each academic year.

Now, if we only focus on a single classroom, you could argue that this 1:40 ratio is too severe since my college actually has a team of employees outside the classroom to help support my students. These include academic counselors, administrators, janitors, maintenance specialist, and technology support staff to name a few.

Following the logic of this argument, let’s try to converge on a more accurate ratio for my individual situation by using data available to the public for the number of students and the number of employees in my specific school district. Below is a sample of ten years of data to help estimate the district-wide brain-to-hands ratios for the school where I work:

Academic Year	Total FTES	Employee Headcount	Brain-to-hands ratio
2006 – 07	35,974	1,287	1:27
2007 – 08	37,364	1,281	1:29
2008 – 09	38,411	1,237	1:31
2009 – 10	37,275	1,203	1:30
2010 – 11	34,646	1,145	1:30
2011 – 12	33,531	1,117	1:30
2012 – 13	32,124	1,065	1:30
2013 – 14	31,943	1,063	1:30
2014 – 15	32,158	1,083	1:29
2015 – 16	31,887	1,358	1:23

Table: Ten Years of Brain-to-Hands Ratio at Foothill-DeAnza Community College District

If we calculate the mean brain-to-hands ratio over the ten academic years highlighted in the table above and round down, we see that my district features a ratio of 1:28. This implies that in the aggregate, every one employee in our district is expected to support the learning needs of approximately 28 students. Imagine the political statement the US government would be making if the tooth-to-tail ratio in our military was not 4:1 but instead 1:28.

Every college educator who thinks seriously about student learning knows the implications of a brain-to-hands ratio that is above 1:1. The moment you put more than one student in my class, I will necessarily be forced to make compromises in my service to the individual in honor of my responsibility to the group. This idea is particularly important for young educators who are preparing to build a career in this profession.

The work we do as educators is fundamental to the functioning of our society. It is essential. In fact, so much of the healthy functioning of industry as well as local, state, and national governments depends on an educated workforce. In spite of this reality, this work is underfunded. The type of compensation teachers earn falls far below the corresponding value that we add. Moreover, the resources allocated to the task of learning are vastly inadequate to achieve our stated goal of supporting success for all students.

The long term question we face in this profession is how can we educate and mobilize public opinion to change the funding structures in education so that future generations of students reap the benefits of adequate investments. Because, the process of legislative change is slow, real change on this front will take sustained activism. The more immediate question for dedicated instructors is how can we be ultra efficient in our job of supporting student learning, regardless of the current budgetary constraints. I plan to dedicate many bytes in future blog posts towards my current answers to this short-term question.

The point of defining the brain-to-hands ratio is to take a sober look at the challenges we face in our classroom and to be able to focus on short-term fixes while keeping our eye on the policy decisions that lead to these challenges.