The Next L.A. / Reinventing Our Future : Education : IDEA FILE: Cut Class Size

How It Works: In the Los Angeles Unified School District it would mean hiring another 25,000 teachers to teach, allowing elementary school classes to be cut from 30 to 15 students. Junior high and high school courses would be reduced from 40 to 20 students.

Benefits: Most educators agree that individual attention is the most important variable in student success: Learning problems are spotted early, questions are answered quickly and each student participates more. Now, about 40% of city school students fail to graduate from high school.

Short-Term or Long-Term Impact?: Somewhere in between.

Supporters: Some educators say it would lead to a better educated community and work force and reduce the dropout rate. They say children of working poor would have a better chance to advance to the middle class and new businesses would be attracted by the higher quality labor pool. Likely to have support of teachers unions.

Opponents: They argue that this idea is very costly in the short-term and the long-term. They also say that, to find all the teachers, a massive, nationwide recruiting effort would be required. In addition, morning and afternoon sessions or other staggered scheduling would have to be implemented. Non-traditional classroom space would have to be found to accommodate twice the number of classes. Likely to face strong opposition from voters and elected officials.

The Costs: More than $1 billion a year, based on average annual salary of $40,000 and a doubling of the 25,000 classroom teachers now in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

REALITY CHECK: Unlikely.