I've bought some great lightweight machines off Craigslist--an old New Home, a Brother ce4000. The Brother is usually what I take to class. Walmart sells them for around $200, I bought mine for $60. You can also check with your local sewing machine dealers for trade-ins like a Janome Gem or Magnolia. It depends on what you want to do in class, obviously if you're taking machine embroidery classes these aren't going to work. If all you want is a regular machine there's as many opinions as there are people on board. I hope this helps. Some will say to get the really small ones. I don't care for those personally. Most reputable dealers will let you try out machines, our Hancocks even will.