Posted on 12/18/2022 10:11:12 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Kansas universities may soon dispense with their algebra graduation requirement because too many students fail the courses.
NPR Kansas recently reported: “About one in three Kansas students fails college algebra the first time around. Some take it several times before they pass. Others get so frustrated that they drop out altogether. And that cuts into university graduation rates.”
NPR added that this prompted the Kansas Board of Regents to consider alternative requirements under what’s called “Math Pathways program.”
Regent Wint Winter (yes, that's his name) said the new Pathways program is critical as a way to fight declining enrollment.
He stated: “It’s incumbent on us to be aware of all the roadblocks that are out there for students … reasons why they’re leaving, reasons why they’re not graduating. So I would urge us all to … find ways to find the bandwidth to keep this moving along.”
If graduation rates are now more important than what students are taught, than why not only offer gender and women’s studies courses…and underwater basket-weaving? Is algebra—algebra!— really too hard for today’s young scholars to handle? In my day, many of us took advanced placement calculus…in high school no less…with credits often transferring to the college of our choice. If calculus, geometry, and even algebra are too difficult for those enrolled in bastions of “higher education” today, perhaps the schools can offer Remedial Addition and Subtraction in their Math pathways programs, assuming they can find “the bandwidth.” What do you think about that, Regent Wint Winter? (Not to be confused with Regent Summ Summer.)
Higher education’s emphasis on enrollment over substance and mission is sadly of a piece with Christian churches’ abandonment of traditional doctrine in favor of a policy of “we must do whatever the hell it takes to put more butts in the pews,
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
At my college we were givenbto option of statistics or linear algebra. I took statistics. That was in 2002
“They will design future bridges, buildings, ships,...”
They will resort to soda submarines! Gotta have a tuff crew tho!
All of the equations we needed for the classes I mentioned were taught to us by our instructors in class as needed. That was my point.
All of the equations we needed for the classes I mentioned were taught to us by our instructors in class as needed. That was my point.
But even understanding the equations requires understanding the basics of algebra.
It is a proven fact that people are naturally split between those who grasp “abstracts” in their brains, and those who do not, and cannot. For the former group, things like more complex maths and even sheet music are only normally hard; but for the latter group, they are just not mentally ‘wired’ to understand them. It is likely a genetic difference, and one or both mental wiring can happen even in the same family.
So trying to “beat” the understanding of abstracts into those not wired for them is just painful and cruel to them.
A good comparison are those people who have the gene that makes cruciferous vegetables, such as broccoli, taste horribly bitter to them. You cannot force them to like or appreciate such vegetables, even if they are made to eat some with every meal. G.H.W. Bush is one of them, and whether or not you like his politics, he was so traumatized by being forced to eat broccoli that he eventually banned it from the White House menu.
So what about requiring success in Algebra or Calculus in school to even graduate? It is just fine for those students who have the wiring for abstracts, but for those who don’t, though they might learn an instrument and music “by ear”, setting them down with sheet music they don’t know and asking them to read it and play it won’t work either.
Ironically, they might play their instrument very well, and there have been several top musicians who were blind, but they still can’t read the abstract of sheet music.
This is plainly not true. I know people who play cards as a child plays cards. Just placing a random one in front of themself.
Playing cards well requires both algebra and statistics.
Ok I don’t know what you mean!
In the first sentence you say, “A is not true!”
The second sentence you say “A is true! is but add statistics. That I agree with but it’s still subject to “algebraic rules” to use properly.
As someone who always had a hard time with math, it seems to me that for the people who are likely to have careers in math and science, higher math is at least do-able, if not easy. And for the rest of us, algebra and calculus are simply useless in real life, so why make us suffer? At 71, I can’t think of a single time when I wished I’d taken calculus in college.
Meanwhile, my son - who graduated from MIT with a degree in Chemical Engineering - was doing calculus in grade school and it was a piece of cake for him (a good thing, as I was no help at all...)
I think brains are just different, and we tend to gravitate toward subjects and careers that align with our innate abilities.
That book, Azimov's "Realm of Algebra," is barely available -- $57 for a USED copy. Those Amazon reviews are as positive as they could be.
Come on, Amazon, give us a low-cost Kindle edition!
I know!
If I had to guess, I bet the Asimov estate is the culprit.
Kansas is supposedly a solid red state, but it’s mostly a RINO state.
I couldn’t get into the pre med Calculus with my schedule. So, I thought I’d take a second year engineering calculus that I could use for the calculus requirement. I got out with a “C” and was damn proud I got that. Most of the engineering students in the class handled it well but there were some having a harder time than I with it.
This one is pretty good for an overview of mathematics:
https://www.amazon.com/Mathematics-Nonmathematician-Morris-Kline/dp/0486248232/
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