Nevada continues to face significant educational funding challenges, according to the National Education Association’s newly released “Rankings of the States 2024 and Estimates of School Statistics 2025” report. The findings reveal a stark reality: Nevada maintains the nation’s highest student-teacher ratio at 25:1, placing considerable strain on classroom resources.

Additionally, the state ranks among the bottom five nationally for educational investment, allocating less than $12,000 per student last year . The annual report estimates and ranks enrollment, attendance, staffing counts and ratios, educator pay, revenues and expenditures for public schools in every state.

Here are additional details: Per-pupil expenditures: Between state, local and federal sources, Nevada spent an estimated $11,927 per student last year, 47th among the 50 states and Washington, D.C. Only Arizona, Oklahoma, Utah and Idaho spent less; Nevada and

Arizona, the fourth-lowest funded state, were separated by $119 in per-student spending. Nevada is consistently in the lowest rung of per-pupil funding. It ranked 47th in the nation in 2022-23, too.

This familiar position was despite much-touted state investments in public education in 2023, when Gov. Joe Lombardo and the Legislature added more than $2 billion in new education funding to the biennial state budget and set aside $250 million for educator raises statewide.

And it comes as the Nevada Economic Forum signed off Thursday on a general fund projection for the next biennium that dropped by $191 million. The National Education Association’s state-level affiliate is the Nevada State Education Association, which has local affiliates representing teachers and support professionals in every school district.

NSEA has consistently criticized the proposed executive budget that Lombardo released earlier this spring showing a $2 per-pupil increase for 2026, and urged continued major increases in education funding to get Nevada out of the funding basement.

“The Forum’s projections make Gov. Lombardo’s proposal of just $2 per student even more insulting,” NSEA President Dawn Etcheverry said in a statement. “With inflation, rising costs and a 3.5% (pension contribution) increase coming in July, the budget proposed by the so-called ‘Education Governor’ amounts to a de facto education cut.”

About two-thirds of total revenues for Nevada’s public schools last year came from the state, the report stated. That made Nevada schools particularly reliant on state dollars as a proportion of their funding — the national breakdown was about 46% state funding, 43% local and 11% federal.

Student-teacher ratios: Nevada’s public schools had 25 students per teacher last school year, well above the national ratio of 15.1 students per teacher. This was the highest ratio in the nation, with nextworse Arizona having 22.6 children per teacher. (Vermont, with 10.4 students per teacher, has the nation’s best ratio.) Although Nevada’s ratio improved slightly from 2022-23, when it had 25.4 students per teacher, it was the worst nationally both years.

Number of teachers: Nevada grew its public school teacher ranks by 12% this year, with about 2,300 more teachers this year than last. While Nevada’s teacher population is relatively small in raw numbers, its teacher corps growth was by far the highest in the country. Nationally, the number of teachers remained flat overall, with several states recording slight drops and others modest increases.

Teacher pay: This was also a bright spot for Nevada’s teachers. The report estimated that the average teacher salary this year was $74,812, which was slightly above the national average of $74,177.

Although being near to the national average means that, by definition, Nevada is middle of the pack on teacher pay, it saw significant recent growth to get there: Last year, the average teacher made $66,930. The previous year, the average wage was $61,719.

The $250 million infusion for Nevada teacher salaries was appropriated only through this school year, and in the Clark County School District, the money has already run out. Lombardo and Democrats, who control the Legislature, however, have proposed extending the funding.

hillary.davis@gmgvegas.com / 702-990-8949 / @HillaryLVSun