School Size/Class Size was Re: Scary Teachers - Good Teachers

[Shaun Hately]

No: HPFGUIDX 152965

On 26 May 2006 at 16:31, ClareWashbrook at aol.com wrote:

>  
> Potioncat:
> 
> I think  we have to use 40 as a base. No 
> matter how many students JKR may indicate  is in Harry's class, she 
> only created 40. 
> 
> 
> Clare:
>  
> Actually JKR said that she only created 40 "with backgrounds"!  She  never 
> stated that 40 was the limit of the intake.  There would be far less  than 600 
> pupils in the school if the intake was 40.
>  
> It is therefore irrational and misleading to base any figures upon the  
> number of students that she created a character/name/purpose for rather than  upon 
> a realistic estimate of the intake.  She has clearly stated that there  are 
> 600 pupils in the school and that there were more than 40 in Harry's  year.  An 
> estimate is not ridiculous but using a figure we know to be wrong  is.

Shaun:
Well, the trouble is, Clare, we don't know it to be wrong. This is a recurring debate and a lot 
of it comes down to how much credence you give various sources of information. Personally I 
think 40 students a year for Harry's year is credible, because that figure can be supported 
based on internal information in the books. And it's not just because we only see 40 
characters with backgrounds - we do have real indications that's there's how many students 
there are.

The following is now a bit out of date - I haven't updated it yet to look at the last two books. 
But it illustrates the point I am making:

Evidence for number of pupils at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and 
Wizardry.

Assumptions:

(1) Each house has at least approximately the same number of pupils
(2) Each year has at least approximately the same number of pupils
(3) There is an approximately equal gender balance at pupils

>From these it follows that, at least in general terms, each 
year/house/gender grouping will have approximately the same number 
of pupils.

All page numbers relate to British Bloomsbury editions.

Item #1

"At three-thirty that afternoon, Harry, Ron, and the other 
Gryffindors hurried down the front steps onto the grounds for their 
first flying lesson. It was a clear, breezy day, and the grass 
rippled under their feet as they marched down the sloping lawns 
toward a smooth, flat lawn on the opposite side of the grounds to 
the forbidden forest, whose trees were swaying darkly in the 
distance.

The Slytherins were already there, and so were twenty broomsticks 
lying in neat lines on the ground. Harry had heard Fred and George 
Weasley complain about the school brooms, saying that some of them 
started to vibrate if you flew too high, or always flew slightly to 
the left."

- Harry Potter and The Philosophers Stone, page 109

This is a joint lesson with Slytherin - therefore the presence of 
twenty brooms would indicate twenty first year students in 
Gryffindor and Slytherin combined - or approximately ten per house.

Item #2

"But he had no time to dwell on this; Professor McGonagall was 
moving along the Gryffindor table, handing out course schedules. 
Harry took his and saw that they had double Herbology with the 
Hufepuffs first...

Professor Sprout was standing behind a trestle bench in the center 
of the greenhouse. About twenty pairs of different-colored ear muffs 
were lying on the bench. When Harry had taken his place between Ron 
and Hermione, she said, "We'll be repotting Mandrakes today. Now, 
who can tell me the properties of the Mandrake?" To nobody's 
surprise, Hermione's hand was first into the air."

- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, page 70, page 72

Here we have a joint lesson with Hufflepuff - again the presence of 
twenty pairs of ear muffs would indicate approximately twenty  
second year students in Gryffindor and Hufflepuff combined, or 
approximately ten per house.

Item #3

"Potions lessons took place in one of the large dungeons. Thursday 
afternoon's lesson proceeded in the usual way. Twenty cauldrons 
stood steaming between the wooden desks, on which stood brass scales 
and jars of ingredients. Snape prowled through the fumes, making 
waspish remarks about the Gryffindors' work while the Slytherins 
sniggered appreciatively. Draco Malfoy, who was Snape's favorite 
student, kept flicking puffer-fish eyes at Ron and Harry, who knew 
that if they retaliated they would get detention faster than you 
could say "Unfair.""

- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, page 140.

Again we have a joint lesson with Slytherin, again we have mention 
of twenty pieces of apparatus - in this case cauldrons. Further 
evidence that the combined Gryffindor/Slytherin second year class 
consists of approximately twenty students - or approximately ten per 
house.

Note - in all three of these examples, we're getting fairly clear 
information on how many students there are in classes that have two 
houses in them for a particular year. And in all three examples, 
involving three of the four houses, the number is twenty - the 
internal evidence of the books is that it's about ten students per 
house per year. Not ten developed characters - ten students. 
Undeveloped characters needs brooms and ear muffs and cauldrons as 
well (-8

Yes, in interviews, JKR has said the school is larger that this - 
but she's given at least two sizes I have heard of - 1000 and 600. 
Her interviews haven't even been consistent on this point. In simple 
terms, JKR really doesn't seem to pay an awful lot of attention to 
numbers.

And there is a real debate as to whether you give what the author 
puts in their books more importance - or what they say they meant in 
an interview. My personal position is I assume the books are correct 
- and I assume interviews are correct *if* they do not contradict 
the books. That's just one position. But I think it's supportable.

And the books do seem to me to point to 40 per year for a total 
school size of 280.

There's other things to consider as well. Hogwarts seems to have 12 
teachers (eventually 13 when Firenze is on staff alongside 
Trelawney). 12 teachers and 280 students gives us a teacher-student 
ratio of 1/23. 600 students would make it 1/50.

Hogwarts doesn't seem to have the necessary staff to have 600 
students really. Not with typical class sizes of 20, anyway. 600 
students at 20 per class would require 30 teachers! OK, senior 
students do have some free periods, so you wouldn't quite need 30 
teachers - but it's problematic when we only have 12. 280 students 
at an average of 20 per class would still need 14 teachers - much 
closer to the number we actually have and easier to explain by free 
periods.

A school size of 600 is difficult to support by external evidence in the books in my view.  

Yours Without Wax, Dreadnought
Shaun Hately | www.alphalink.com.au/~drednort/thelab.html
(ISTJ)       | drednort at alphalink.com.au | ICQ: 6898200 
"You know the very powerful and the very stupid have one
thing in common. They don't alter their views to fit the 
facts. They alter the facts to fit the views. Which can be 
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