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Locked on 12/14/2022 9:10:48 PM PST by Jim Robinson, reason:
Flame wars |
Posted on 12/13/2022 3:57:49 AM PST by DFG
The Kansas Board of Regents is considering stripping specific university math requirements after it was found that a significant percentage of college freshmen fail algebra, NPR affiliate KCUR reported.
The Regents, who oversee the system’s six public universities, are considering implementing the Math Pathways approach which matches students to a math course based on their major instead of mandating algebra for all incoming students. While many universities require that all freshmen pass algebra as a prerequisite for graduation, one in three Kansas students reportedly fail the course, which could delay a student’s graduation.
Daniel Archer, vice president of academic affairs for the Kansas Board of Regents, said that algebra is not always necessary for many students. Only 20 percent of majors require higher-level math beyond algebra, KCUR reported.
“We’re sending the majority of students down the college algebra road, which is really not necessary,” Archer said. “It’s not practical. It’s not really needed. And it’s not relevant for their fields.”
he Math Pathways approach offers students the option of taking alternatives to algebra such as statistics and quantitative reasoning, according to its 2018 brief. Its summary claims that algebra is a “gatekeeper to higher education for students not majoring in a math-heavy field.”
(Excerpt) Read more at tennesseestar.com ...
“We did algebra in 6th grade. How does a college student fail algebra?”
Really. How stupid ARE today’s students? In order to get a NYS Regents Diploma in the ‘60s we had to pass three years of math — Algebra, Geometry, and Trig. No way around that.
Why would someone need algebra skills to get a gender studies degree?
Very few students in K-12 are incapable of mastering basic mathematics, including Algebra I.
The problem is the K-12 schools that graduate these math-inept college freshmen: Their ineffective “teaching” methods and materials, their watered-down academic standards, and their corrupt teachers and administrators. The absence of at least one parent in the math-inept childs’s life who demands better, including from the student, is typically the final ingredient in this stew of incompetence.
my quick, 1 question math test:
You ring up the charge, it’s 82 cents.
The customer hands you a one dollar bill, and seven cents.
What do you return to the customer?
If you can’t figure it out, you’re not college material.
I graduated High School in 1975. I had already taken Pre-Calculus & Trigonometry.
66 years old, Master Plumber for 45 years and can honestly say I have never used Algabra for anything! To me its like learning French, whats the point!!
Let’s be honest, these are the social promotion students who can’t pass ARITHMETIC.
If students can’t pass the test, change the test. That’ll teach ‘em.
Please go to #20 to see the Kansas 8th grade test given in 1895.
Don’t be thrown by the arcane measurements, [rods, bushels etc.] as they had been taught to the Kansas farm kids all along.
The rest of the test [English, geography, history, etc] is just as depressing, comparing how far standards have sunk in a century and a quarter.
It was not then so remarkable that 2 Ohio bicycle shop owners invented the airplane, tested wing profiles in a home-made wind tunnel, designed their own aluminum-block ICE engine, etc.
Their 1890s high school educations were more rigorous than college today.
Pls see 20 and 29.
That’s not a good example, all they have to do is look at the registers screen and it tells them.
I like the old school cashiers who are able to count the change to equal what you gave them: “here’s your change, 85 and a quarter equal 1.07”. They are few and far between.
No wonder the taxpayers have to pay their tuition. The idiot Snowflakes and Zeros can’t learn anything. They’re too busy sitting on their asses, getting high and pokin’ their cellphones.
Sixth grade is not too early for rudimentary exposure to algebra. The simple stuff familiarizes the child with the nomenclature so when stuff like irrational numbers comes along it makes some sense.
In Toronto’s race-obsessed school system, their “anti-black racism” equity initiatives has led to the the merger of advanced and applied classes in math and languages to a single “for dummies” class. So now, all the bright, responsible students good marks can bell up the curve of the “racialized” students failing grades in order to improve class averages. Punishing the bright kids by forcing them to sit through boring, basic classes is the school board’s cure for racism.
Algebra?,
Wasn’t that the name of a horse in the Our Gang serials.
What is the average IQ of those students who cannot pass the algebra course? Perhaps the Kansas universities should consider tightening up their admission standards.
Oh, wait. That might affect football team rankings.
Just wondering, which majors will they drop the algebra requirement for graduation?
I would be willing to bet you use it a lot and do not even realize it.
Exactly. I have worked in education for over 30 years. I work in a city high school. The school is 99% black, with a few hispanic and white kids. The average student walking in my door reads at the mid 4th grade level and can do math at the early 4th grade level. They take algebra, geometry and algebra II. Everything is so watered down, they pass classes and get grades, but they understand nothing. Everything is done on TI calculators and the students have no quantitative understanding. Most of them will walk out the door with 8th grade math skills at best. And then people wonder why these students can’t pass college algebra?
None of these students ever mastered basic math (+, -, X, /) and most cannot do fractions or use decimals. It is extraordinarily hard to do algebra when you can’t do 45 / 9.
As a society, now we move to dumb down college for the sake of equity.
How far did the students progress by the end of K-12?
I was in advanced classes. Are those still allowed? In high school I got as far as calculus-1 and calculus-2.
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