I see your point on the OWLs, Blackdogstar... I was just thinking that it might make it possible to only have 13 or so teachers? Like I said, I'm not too good in the math department...

Phil- I got the same impression as you, of a very tight knit school.

Blackdogstar- was Astromomy a required course too? We heard very little about it, and I don't remember if Harry signed up for it or not in 3rd year... I'll have to check... *wanders off pondering...*







*thought of something else: Flying lessons with the Slytherins &quot;There were 20 broomsticks lying there...&quot; This whole Yule Ball, a 'fleet of boats' and a '100 or so carriages' is throwing me off though... ahh!<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START :shrug --><img src=http://pages.prodigy.net/siriusblack/boards/smilies/shrug.gif ALT=":shrug]<!--EZCODE EMOTICON END-->





~peach <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START :sortg --><img src=http://pages.prodigy.net/siriusblack/boards/smilies/sorting_gryf.gif ALT=":sortg]<!--EZCODE EMOTICON END-->"Just because you have the emotional range of a teaspoon Ron, doesn't mean we all have"

I have come to the conclusion that Astronomy is a core course, as well. It's just taken at midnight, so I guess it doesn't affect their days much. There is a required OWL exam. And Ron tells them second year that classes are repeat, every class. (I was looking that up after I posted the thing on core courses.)



RE: Brooms in flying lessons.



I reckon that more than twenty people on brooms would've been a bit much even for Madam Hooch. We don't actually get through with more than the first turn before Neville gets sent off to Madam Pomfrey.

<span style="color:blue;font-family:times new roman;font-size:x-small;]Humbly Yours,

Black DogStar[/color]





<span style="color:purple;font-family:Christmas;font-size:medium;]Brilliant, Snape; once again you've put your keen and penetrating mind

to the task and as usual come to the wrong conclusion.[/color]

OK, I freely admit I did not read every reply in this thread carefully enough to know if anyone else brought this up or not. My theory on the size of Harry's class/year vs the size of the classes/years ahead of him are...Lord Voldemort. Remember, when Harry (and in essence all other kids his age) was being born Voldemort was in power. If Hitler was in power today, how many people who fear him and his rule would be willing to have children? If HVoldemort was not so much "in power" in previous years to the year Harry and his classmates were born and just annoying everyone a bit, nothing there to make you truly want to prevent children from coming into the world. Does this make sense to anyone else?



Eey

I was looking around the HP Lexicon yesterday, and I came across this essay about exactly what we are talking about in this thread. It takes into consideration many of the things that we have already talked about here and interviews with Rowling herself. From it we learn that though JKR has said that there are about a thousand students attending Hogwarts there is alot of evidence showing otherwise. We can tell from interviews and evidence in the books that maybe math isn't exactly her strong point. We can just figure that if JK says that there are a thousand students at Hogwats, then there are a thousand students.



eeyore9990: I think I understand what you're saying, but I'm not sure. Do you mean that because of Voldemort "being in power" there were less children born because people were afraid?

eeyore...if you could, you should take the time to read the entire thread. There's lots of good stuff in there...



Cheers.

<span style="color:blue;font-family:times new roman;font-size:x-small;]Humbly Yours,

Black DogStar[/color]



[img]http://12.22.230.41/MicroTech/Hosted/Images/cannonsmall.JPG [/img]<span style="color:purple;font-family:Christmas;font-size:small;]I don't care how heavy it is...you gotta bring it![/color]Sirius made a little cubby for it on the Marauder Mobile...so yes, it fits in the hot tub!<span style="color:red;font-family:times new roman;font-size:x-small;]Please, go to the Daily Prophet and readBegging For Your Help ![/color]

I wanted to get back to the Sorting process first, because this intrigued me. I wouldn't want to believe that people would just be stuck somewhere to fill out some random quota, but there are definitely a few students that didn't fit in their houses. Peter Pettigrew, for one--riddle me this, Batman, how was he EVER sorted in Gryffindor? And Percy Weasley; we've not seen much of him being brave, but we have definitely seen "great ambition."



I think it's a combination of factors, and numbers do play a part, but aren't the total of it. Because on the other hand, the whole house system is based on the fact that the original four founders only accepted students that exhibited the traits they wanted. Unless the hat had pretty much decided to disregard that, he should have to put the bravest in Gryffindor and so forth. He SHOULD. With Percy and Pettigrew, I don't see that he did, but maybe there's more there than meets the eye, and JK has plans for it down the road.



As to the House sizes, I read an article about how students for Hogwarts are chosen, and there were a few good points made. For one, I don't think class sizes are at all the same from year to year. Those children who are born with a certain level of magic power are accepted into Hogwarts, and those that don't become the Stan Shunpikes and dishwashers at the Leaky Cauldron, probably through some apprenticing system. I think it was Molly Weasley who was "so proud" when Ginny got her Hogwarts letter. That, to me, indicates that there was doubt; that NOT getting a Hogwarts letter is a possibility for wizard children. Thus, class size could vary from year to year.



The rest of the previously mentioned logic is sound; there have been quite a few unnamed students at Hogwarts, and who would really want to know the names of 1000 students? It seems the number of classes taken shrink after OWL year, as the students are starting to specialize more. It most likely depends on what the specialty is; more classes would be necessary for an Auror than for someone going into Muggle Relations.



Lastly, Hogwarts is based on the British school system of the seventies, so after OWL year, students have the option of not continuing with their studies. How many of them leave, we don't know (other than Fred and George, of course) but it's an option that would lower class size in sixth and seventh year.



Most of this information was from the Lexicon; don't know if you all want me to quote it directly or not.

Hooch has 20 broomsticks and says "everybody stand by a broomstick". So there could not have been more than 20 students there, which makes at least 10 Gryffindors and 10 or less Slytherins in Harry's year (we know from that interview there are at least 10 Gryffindors).



So I'm thinking either Jo made a mistake (she has admitted there are some bugs in the books) or there happened to be very few Slyths and Gryffs that year.

Edited by: <A HREF=http://p072.ezboard.com/bsiriusblackfanclub.showUserPublicProfile?gid=emma@siriusblackfanclub>Emma[/url] at: 8/15/04 12:53 pm

Okay, here are my thoughts.



THere are 1000 students in Hogwarts. It makes sense. Its the only wizarding school in Great Britain (or so I've gathered... correct me if I'm wrong), and since Great Britain has a population of 60 million people, that puts the total population of the wizarding world at about... (based on the demographics of my hometown) 7000. That includes all ages, from infants to octoganarians. I'm fairly sure there is more than 5000 wizards in the wizarding world in GB.



So, if there are 1000 students, why doesn't JKR name them all? Because they are not important. And, it gives her leeway to introduce more characters that might be in the same year, I suppose. But could you imainge us poor readers, trying to keep straight the 1000 hogwarts students, plus the other 150 characters, Jo has out there? That would be one hard job.



I realise that in the book it says there is 5 four-posters in the dormotory... but there is, most likely, more than one room per year. Could you imagine having 31 kids in one room? No one would get any sleep, or have any privacy. I think she's referring to each of the rooms, when she says "dormotories", since Harry doesn't see any of the other rooms, the room he shares with Neville, Dean, Seamus and Ron is "his" dormotory.



Here is how I figure it.. (And these numbers are round numbers, meaning hey might be higher, or lower, in any given year, for any given demographic.)



If there are 1000 students, that is 250 students per house. Divided by 7, that is 62.5 students per year, per house, or around 30 boys and 30 girls.



There is probably 7 dorm rooms per year for each of the boys and girls - 6 rooms of 5, but there might be more than 30 boys in a year in Hufflepuff, so the extra room would accomodate them.



If there were only 300 students in all of Hogwarts, that would only be 75 students per house. The books make it sound like there is many, many more than this, and the movies show over 200 students per house table (sorry if you disagree, my estimation skills are atrocious). Something like this, Jo would probably have had a hand in, like shewhat Dean looked like because even though it is a minor detail, it is important to the overall effect of the Wizarding World. I mean, Hogwarts would still be impressive if it was 300 students... but not THAT impressive. And, coming from a Jr/Sr High school of 300 students myself, Harry would probably know a whole lot more people.



As for classes and things... there are ways to work that out. There are probably professors we don't know about, teaching some of the more advanced subjects, or maybe the teachers have time turners.... <img border=0 src="http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/wink.gif" />



I'd also like to point out tha just because 3rd years have Care of Magical Creatures, Mondays before lunch one year, that doesn't guarantee the scheduals won't change. They probably will, depending on the teaching staff - some teachers might like to try teaching something new one year, and keep all of their previous classes but one (Class A) to make room for the new one (Class B). That would rearrange the schedule, because they would have to find a teacher to teach Class A, and it would depend on that teacher's schedule as to when Class A is taught.



Or, if a new teacher comes in, and has one specialty, but is pretty good at something else too, they might take over the beginning classes for their second topic (the one they're pretty good at.)



My mom was a teacher, so I know how weird teaching schedules can be. Of course, my school was small... and in a school the size of hogwarts they probably don't have such a problem. My school had several Professional Time-table planners (yes, they do exisist) quit on them, because most of our teachers have double-subjects. Eg, my grade 12 physics teacher also taught grade 11 chemistry, as well as computer tech and Animation. You get the picture.Cheers!~Des~



<span style="color:green;font-size:small;]Lucky M0, on sheep:[/color]<span style="color:green;font-size:x-small;]&quot;Sheep are so VERSATILE. You can use them as a table. As a soccer ball - kick them and they make funny noises!&quot;[/color]



<span style="color:purple;font-size:small;]See SAAW [/color]

Sirius was about to open the door. "What are you doing?" Several Angels cried.

"Opening the door, so we can all go out and give those slimy little toerags our sacrafice. Sammi." he said, giving her a nasty look. She, however, did not notice, as she was too busy looking at Lupin, who was just as busy looking the other way.

Aloha... Just thought I'd add a completely different idea to the thread...

Term always starts on September the first.

But, unless I am really mistaken and in that case I'm sorry and ignore me, the classes always seem to start the next day which is always a Monday...

Sorry I was discussing this this morning...really glad to be able to rant on.

And also, the older students may have study periods like i do. 4 out of 62 periods a week are left free.

Just another thought

^ No, I noticed that as well, and it really annoyed me! I mean, even in the magical world, they wouldn't change the days so Hogwarts always starts on a Monday...grrr.

---

As for amount of wizarding population in Britain - I tryed to cipher it as well. Here are my calculations:



We have:

1) Total population of Great Britain (at 1999) - 59,113 million.



2) Age percentage:

0-14 years - 19%

15-64 - 65%

65 and more - 16%



3) According to Rowling, Hogwarts has about 800 pupils (BTW, that doesn't shut out the possibility of Harry having only nine classmates - maybe, that year was lean for brave and chivalrous?)



4) Life expactancy of an average British muggle is 77,37 years (at 1999).



5) Life expactancy of an average British wizard is far (at least twice) more than muggle's.



6) Wizard achieve puberty approximately at the same age as muggles (example: James and Lily had Harry when they were about twenty).



7) Until certain moment wizards, despite larger life expectancy, develop in the same pace as muggles.





Now let's assume:

1) An average number of children in wizarding families (including mixed marriages) is close to that in muggles' ones. Aforecited age percentage is approximately the same in wizarding Britain.



2) Chances for birth of a muggleborn and a squib are nearly equal, so we can leave it out of account.



3) On the principle that wizards develop in the same way as muggles at least until maturity, we can assume that theit life expactancy grows due to stretching of senility. It is considered in '65 and more', so it doesn't affect calculations with pupils.



4) During last 20 years amount of British population as well as age percentage haven't changed very much.



5) Overwhelming majority of wizarding children of Great Britain study at Hogwarts (quite arguable though).





So, we got a sum:

1) If NHP is number of Hogwarts' pupils, then:

NHP/7 - number of wizarding British children of the same age (coevals)

NHP/7*14 = NHP*2 - number of wizarding British children below 14



2) NHP*2 is 19% of all wizarding population; then wizarding population (WP) of Great Britain is NHP*2*100/19



3) If NHP=800,

WP=800*2*100/19=8421 wizards (approximately).



As a result, we get about 8,5 thousands wizards in Great Britain. Not so many <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START : --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/ohwell.gif ALT=":]<!--EZCODE EMOTICON END-->Edited by: <A HREF=http://p072.ezboard.com/bsiriusblackfanclub.showUserPublicProfile?gid=missirius>Missirius[/url] at: 8/22/04 6:26 am

JKR probably does that just to make it easier for herself to write. She has enough to keep straight without mudane details like what day comes after Sept. 1st.



Sidenote: Doesn't it say in one of the books (not 4 or 5, have them with me) "The following monday classes began", to paraphrase badly. I seem to remember something like that, but I might be thinking of after Christmas and Easter holidays.

Cheers!~Des~



<span style="color:magenta;font-family:century gothic;font-size:xx-small;]Currently in SAAW [/color]<span style="color:purple;font-family:century gothic;font-size:xx-small;]

A bass beat began to pound through the room as Umbridge pumped up the volume. To everyone's horror, Umbridge pushed Shackles off the desk and climbed up, conjuring up giant laser lights and began to sing along... &quot;I - LIKE - BIG BUTTS AND I CANNOT LIE! You other brothers can't deny!&quot; She put one hand on her head and another on her back and squat a bit, thrusting her butt out.

[/color]

In PoA when they are searching the castle for Sirius, DD puts out 100s of sleeping blankies. Seems to me the student population must be below 1000 by how Rowling worded it.

I would like to bring up Luna Lovegood.



We had relatively no idea she exsisted until OotP.

Quote::

The girl beside the window looked up...Harry knew at once why Neville had chosen to pass this compartment by. The girl gave off and aura of distinct dottiness... OotP pg. 185

From the quote we can assume that Harry, as well as we readers, did not know/had never meet Luna until Ginny introduced her.

Quote::

"You're Harry Potter," she added. "I know I am," said Harry. Neville chuckled. Luna turned her pale eyes upon him instead. "And I don't know who you are." OotP pg. 185

Again, this proves that no one but Ginny and Luna had met before. Granted Luna was in Ginny's year, but she had obviously been going to Hogwarts the entire for years (note Ginny calling her "Loony" Lovegood...this girl already had a rep.) Yet, Harry had never met her before this occasion.



The point I am trying to make is there are likely loads of people we haven't met yet. Luna didn't come in until the fifth book and she played a relatively large role in the book. I think that there are several faceless/nameless students luking in Hogwarts that may or may not be introduced to us later. Either way, the 1000 students is not too much of a stretch.



Hope this helps.



P.S. I know this doesn't explain the 20 earmuffs/broomsticks problem, but what can I say...It's late

Edited by: <A HREF=http://p072.ezboard.com/bsiriusblackfanclub.showUserPublicProfile?gid=dracostwin>DracosTwin[/url]&nbsp; at: 10/28/04 10:24 pm

Okay, I know this thread has been idle for a very long time, but one has took look after ones own, does one not?



And, after all, I'm still interested in anyones thoughts on the number of teachers in relation to number of pupils/time to teach.



The Gryffindor common room is another point of context. How could such a small room hold 300-odd people?



An idea that occurred to me is that perhaps the teachers have time-turners, but why the fig would JK bother with that?



Meh, I'm tired



Phillip

XxX Pippi XxX