https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-the-best-schools/5335/

While Arizona is well known for the Grand Canyon and gorgeous sunsets, the state has recently adopted something else to be known for: having one of the worst education systems in the United States.

In the 2016 Wallethub report on the best and worst education systems, Arizona ranked as number 48, making us the fourth worst education system in the nation, including the District of Columbia.

The Wallethub survey was conducted using two different dimensions: “School-System Quality” and “School-System Safety.” Each category had several subcategories that were given different weights.

With the weights covering 16 different subcategories, there is a fairly decent variety of areas considered in the survey, but some have argued that this made some of the categories receive much more or less weight than they should have.

For example, one state might rely on their outstanding SAT scores to bring them up on the list, but since that weight only accounted for about eight percent of the survey’s weight, they are left lower on the leaderboard.

However, just because the survey was released indicating that Arizona has a terrible education system does not necessarily mean that it is correct for every school in the state. Serrano said, “I think they based it all on money per student, which we are one of the worst in the nation, but if you look at our [ACT scores]… we are right above the national average.”

Because the quality of each state’s education can be determined by many different aspects, it is almost impossible to create an entirely accurate survey. For example, had they conducted the survey based on ACT scores, Arizona would have been considerably higher in the rankings.