Requiring Algebra II in high school gains momentum nationwide

Washington Post ^ | April 3, 2011 | Peter Whoriskey

[reaganaut1]

With its intricate mysteries of quadratics, logarithms and imaginary numbers, Algebra II often provokes a lament from high-schoolers.

What exactly does this have to do with real life?

The answer: maybe more than anyone could have guessed.

Of all of the classes offered in high school, Algebra II is the leading predictor of college and work success, according to research that has launched a growing national movement to require it of graduates.

In recent years, 20 states and the District have moved to raise graduation requirements to include Algebra II, and its complexities are being demanded of more and more students.

The effort has been led by Achieve, a group organized by governors and business leaders and funded by corporations and their foundations, to improve the skills of the workforce. Although U.S. economic strength has been attributed in part to high levels of education, the workforce is lagging in the percentage of younger workers with college degrees, according to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development.

But exactly how to raise the education levels of the U.S. workforce is a matter of debate. And whether learning Algebra II causes students to fare better in life, or whether it is merely correlated with them doing better — because smart, motivated kids take Algebra II — isn’t clear. Meanwhile, some worry that Algebra II requirements are leading some young people to quit school.

The District this year joins other states requiring high school graduates to meet the Achieve standards that include Algebra II; Maryland and Virginia do not.

But no state has pushed Algebra II more than Arkansas, which began requiring the class last year for most graduates

[Eepsy]

They’re going to have a hard time for requiring Algebra II for high school when they don’t bother requiring fractions for graduating elementary school or the times table for leaving third grade....

[wintertime]

Teacher’s Unions
^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I can see it now. In 50 years people will say, our health care system will not improve until Doctors and Nurses Unions are out of the picture.

No....The problem is having government in the picture!

[Oshkalaboomboom]

Stuff Algebra, teach them the mathematics of basic finance. Maybe then they will understand why it isn’t good to borrow 800 dollars a week when you only make 100.

[DTA]

>>>>>>A large fraction of the population does not have the capacity for abstract thinking to do Algebra II<<<<<

Add to this that 25% of general population can not do even the basic math and you get very disturbing picture.

You know, the average Obummer voter.

[jaybee]

OK, fellow smarty-pants here as well. Got through College Algebra in high school.

BUT.......Think back to your high school requirements. What did the lowest-performers have to do to get a diploma? Business math? Consumer math? My public high school, considered the best in the county, did NOT require all this abstract math in the 1970s to get a diploma.

The whole math thing is part of the “no one is different, equal outcomes for everyone, everyone goes to college” mantra.

All we are doing by not providing real-world math as a substitute requirement is churning out dropouts. And maybe for some, learning how to measure, do fractions and make change is a better use of time than the quadratic equation.

[truthkeeper]

As others have noted, the solution is to have a viable Junior High School diploma which certifies that the holder can read and write tolerably, and do math through fractions and percents. Have school end for them at 16, and have them shift to job training.

Oh please. So I was lousy at Algebra...in the end I passed. I also was a National Merit Letter of Commendation awardee, made the Dean's list in college, graduated with a degree in English, and later earned a paralegal certificate. I am very successful in my career, which, trust me, ain't easy.

By your thinking I suppose I wasn't college material. To that I say "hogwash."

[kosciusko51]

I work for an engineering company in NJ. The technical work force has no Caucasian Americans under the age of 30 and no African Americans at all.

I am a mechanical engineer, and I haven't seen the lack of Caucasian Americans under 30 for our company. However, the number of AAs in mechanical engineering is quite low.

[Macoozie]

Algebra by middle school.
Calculus in High School.

We taught my nieces and nephews to were do quadratics in 5th grade. It ain’t hard, just requires practice and an open mind.

Now, trying to figure out why anyone voted for the Teleprompter-in-Chief, now that is a mind-numbing problem.

[SuzyQue]

Bookmark.

[ScottinVA]

I’m amazed this even has to be an issue. We hear all these lamentations about how our children aren’t ready for college, we don’t graduate enough engineers and doctors, etc., etc.

Well, we either get the ball rolling or we don’t. Looks like they’ll have to delete one of their Gay History or Multiculturalism Appreciation class time slots.

Oh, the huge manatee!

[wmileo]

Sorry for not specifically mentioning ‘the government’. of course the government involvement has corrupted public education. But in my day in the public school system of the 1950s and early 1960s( before the teachers’ unions) public education worked very well.

The worst thing to happen to Public Education is the classroom teacher with a 4 year degree in Education but no competency in the subjects they are supposed to teach.

[ScottinVA]

Algebra II is not hard. I went to a private high school, and until reading this argument I thought public schoolers were required to take Algebra II just like I was.

I also went to a private high school and took Algebra II. I did find it challenging, but got through it anyway. I, too was surprised public schoolers aren't required to take it.

[elk]

Hmmm, my kids had Algebra 2 wired by third grade (age 10)

No insult meant to BobL by any means, but it's NOT amazing, when you consider that public schools do so much damage to the love of learning in children by age 10.

If a child skips the "whole math" and that sight-see un-reading method, they may be able to accomplish quite a bit. And, if tutored by someone who knows math and can demystify it, calculus can be achieved quite early.

Ask most humble homeschoolers their observations. Those with supposedly "over-achieving" kids will tell you that it's not miraculous; it's just removing the artificial barriers placed in front of children in our current institutional educrat system.

Look at history, perhaps even just American history (not the new-and-rewritten version), and see what 16-year-olds were doing. What ships they were captain of, businesses they were running, etc. Makes our current crop of 16-year-olds look like a bunch of lazies and loosers.

Sorry to have to say it.

Pitiful.

[redgolum]

My wife teaches Algebra II in a local high school. You can’t teach Algebra to everyone when half the kids can’t add without a calculator.

[MrB]

I have a four year old that can tell you what you need to add to 7 to get 10... it’s just a matter of what you expect from them, a lot of the time.

“Kids don’t need to know the addition/multiplication tables! That’s what calculators are for!”

[super7man]

Same with my kids. You are right about Saxon Math. Today’s math text books are full of fluff. Lots of pictures and stories about how math “saved the day”, but not too much actual math.

[sitetest]

Dear Alberta's Child,

“And yet I eventually understood all of it . . . it’s just that I was kind of like a year behind schedule.”

I know a fellow (Masters in math, a whiz in math applications in software) who says that math is best learned “twice baked,” meaning that the second time you learn a chunk of math, it settles in your head, and you go from a modest competency to something closer to mastery.

In my sons’ high school, much of the first quarter (even the first semester) of each math class is a recapitulation of the prior year's work. Some folks (like my younger son) think this is a pure waste of time, but for many folks (like my older son), it gives them a chance to really solidify what they sort of half-got the year before.

sitetest

[wmileo]

I have a Electrical Engineering Degree and the firm I work for provides telecom solutions.

Most of the folks I know who are Mechanical Engineers work for firms which are involved with HVAC, refrigeration, etc. They all have their own businesses and the work is intensely hands-on and outdoors. According to several of these friends, it is next to impossible to find young folks in the AA community who want to start on the bottom and work their way up in a profession like that.

After trying to recruit in the AA community for 15 years now(since his son graduated HS and started working with him while attending college), he has finally given up and started hiring a number of Hispanics who are not afraid of hard outdoor work but have poor written and verbal language skills. Designing and installing Geothermal Heat Pumps for small businesses and private homes is the work that keeps him busy now.

[PATRIOT1876]

Does this mean that the children will have to sacrifice their other classes to have Algebra?
Such as:

Cultural Diversity
Global Warming, SUV’s and You
Aztlan Studies
America Bad, Other countries Good
State Atheism (required)
Snooki’s Fashion and Home Ec
Voodoo Economics
Great Leaders of the Democrat Party
Submit to Islam
Communism, the Worker’s Paradise

[sheana]

Had a rough time in high school with math. Went to college in my late 20’s and took Alegebra I & II via math labs (no teacher, own pace). It clicked well. Years later was trying to help my daughter in Algebra I. Her books sucked!! Pulled out my old self teach book and she used it to supplement her book and finally ‘got it’.