[Matticus_Rex]

There's a lot of experimentation with pedagogy, and the gains are marginal. Student/teacher ratios have a mild effect on academic outcomes, but academic outcomes have very little effect on anything measurable in terms of building human capital or long-term retention.

School funding is similar to the ratio question. Most increases in school funding over the last 50 years get captured by the state and local administrations, which provides even less for outcomes than teacher pay, ratios, or increased resources. Pouring more money into them doesn't usually chance that allocation -- it's like giving money to a homeless family and having one of the parents take the money to buy non-essentials.

In the mean time, kids are wasting away, bored out of their minds. The opportunity costs are massive, and the social returns are negative. We can talk all we want about how we can make the system better, but until it actually gets better, the waste continue and victimizes more kids.