# Virginia educrats drop the hammer on advanced math education **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 20, 2021, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396 "2021-04-20T19:24:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![ZosterSandstorm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ZosterSandstorm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZosterSandstorm)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2021, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/161 "2021-04-26T23:29:01Z")
> [@BippityBoppityBoo](#): > > Any private school can offer calculus in kindergarten if they want to. Every college and university can offer calculus forevermore. Nothing more progressive than “If you want an education that matches your ability level, just be born to rich parents!” ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2021, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/162 "2021-04-26T23:55:29Z")
I’m actually ok with “replace calculus with nothing”. That’s already the de facto standard in many places, especially for those not on a college track. And 100 years ago, it was exceedingly rare even for those on a college track to have taken it. Even now, Math 101 at my alma mater (Rice U) is differential calculus - they don’t assume any of their incoming students have taken it, despite being a relatively selective school. This is precisely the problem. We shouldn’t be thinking in terms of “replacing” or whatever. We should instead be thinking of what should constitute a modern liberal high school education. If that includes calculus, that’s fine. If not, that’s also fine. But what is not fine is getting stuck thinking in terms of specific courses or ‘tradition’ or anything like that. ---
**Author:** ![ZosterSandstorm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ZosterSandstorm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZosterSandstorm)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/163 "2021-04-27T00:07:42Z")
> [@Great\_Antibob](#): > > Even now, Math 101 at my alma mater (Rice U) is differential calculus - they don’t assume any of their incoming students have taken it, despite being a relatively selective school. ? The fact that the course is offered implies that at least one student has not taken it before, not that no students have taken it before. The courses that one can get [credit](https://rice.app.box.com/s/xx841hg51mupe4pmiqcmb54852m9pgzs) for at Rice with the AP calculus tests are coded 105 and 106, suggesting they may be somewhat more in depth than the university’s 101 course. One can also see that only [four](https://courses.rice.edu/courses/!SWKSCAT.cat?p_action=QUERY&p_term=202110&p_ptrm=&p_crn=&p_onebar=&p_mode=AND&p_subj_cd=MATH&p_subj=MATH&p_dept=&p_school=&p_spon_coll=&p_df=&p_insm=&p_submit=) sections of 101 are offered per semester. Rice has [over 4000 students](https://oir.rice.edu/students-scholars/enrollment/enrollment-majorprogram) currently enrolled in math, science, engineering, and economics majors who will need to take or test out of calculus, so obviously there are a huge number of people who meet or exceed the standard of the introductory calculus class without taking 101 at the university. I can’t imagine that there is any university comparable to Rice (highly selective, STEM-focused) where less than an absolute majority of admitted freshmen have already passed a calculus class in high school. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/164 "2021-04-27T00:22:17Z")
heres another story on it that clarifies things a bit: [https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/no-virginia-is-not-moving-to-eliminate-advanced-high-school-math-classes/ar-BB1g54On?ocid=SK2DDHP](https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/no-virginia-is-not-moving-to-eliminate-advanced-high-school-math-classes/ar-BB1g54On?ocid=SK2DDHP) ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/165 "2021-04-27T00:57:07Z")
If we can spend millions on sports just to give kids a “reason to come to school”, surely we can scrape together 10% of that to offer advanced academics for kids who are thrilled by that. ---
**Author:** ![BippityBoppityBoo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bippityboppityboo/32/5745_2.png) [@BippityBoppityBoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BippityBoppityBoo)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/166 "2021-04-27T01:58:46Z")
No argument from me at all. The people who are willing to lay out tax dollars for sports are, IME, rarely part of the critical mass clamoring for more enrichment and individualization and, of course, inclusion. BTW, all three of my kids went for the advanced academics, never the sports. It was a full time job for one of their parents just to get them an appropriate and differentiated education, so I’m on your side. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/167 "2021-04-27T03:09:49Z")
> [@ZosterSandstorm](#): > > Nothing more progressive than “If you want an education that matches your ability level, just be born to rich parents!” That’s not what’s being said at all. Offering calculus in kindergarten would be silly, counterproductive, not in the best interests of the students, etc., etc. If you really really want to do it, go for it, but the public schools have as their mission attempting to achieve the greatest good for the greatest number of students. Are Virginia students under the current standards achieving as much as they could achieve, or could they do better with a different mathematical progression? You may be satisfied that they’re fifth in the nation or whatever, but they’d like to be number one. ---
**Author:** ![ZosterSandstorm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ZosterSandstorm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZosterSandstorm)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/168 "2021-04-27T03:14:29Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > . If you really really want to do it, go for it, but the public schools have as their mission attempting to achieve the greatest good for the greatest number of students. So I guess we’re going to get rid of special education for kids who will never become traditional academic achievers, right? They sure take a disproportionate amount of funding away from the “greatest good for the greatest number.” That kind of thinking is where your grey-goo approach leads. Demanding parity for high achievers with the way disabled students are treated (i.e. a similar consideration of their unique individual needs and the establishment of a legally codified right to a _developmentally appropriate education_ rather than just an open school building) has become a vogue lately among parent groups and I can’t say their argument isn’t convincing. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/169 "2021-04-27T03:29:20Z")
You misunderstand yet again. They have as their mission achieving as much as possible for the special ed kids, for the average kids, and for the superstars. ALL THREE GROUPS (and all the ones in between) are important. The schools have studies that seem to show that early tracking _actively harms_ average to below-average kids while not providing a whole lot of benefit to the high achievers. Do you have countervailing studies showing that tracking elementary / middle school students in math leads to better outcomes for any group, including the high achievers? Do the students tracked into higher levels in 5th or 6th or 8th grade end up with higher scores on high school achievement exams, or higher pass rates on AP or college calculus, for example, than their socioeconomic peers who were not so tracked? Do you have any real evidence on the subject, other than your feelings and suppositions? ---
**Author:** ![ZosterSandstorm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ZosterSandstorm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZosterSandstorm)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/170 "2021-04-27T03:30:15Z")
That clarifies nothing. First off, the reporter can’t get her biases straight - if the only people opposed to this are “right-wing news outlets” then why was the first person to call attention to it Ian Serotkin, a school board member who is a Democrat? Why the well-poisoning (“you can’t be opposed to this unless you’re a right-wing pundit therefore all correct-thinking people must support it”) in an article purporting to be news content and not an op/ed? Why the irrelevancies (the fact that the proposal isn’t law yet says nothing about whether the proposal is a good one or not)? Why the ridiculous transcription of insane claims (that we’re going to teach “data science and data analytics” before any basic statistics course)? The worst problem isn’t the reporter’s though, it’s the fact that the people behind this have no credibility. They were the same ones that turned “let’s find space for a few more black students at TJ” into “let’s supplement the standardized test with other factors” and finally passed “no testing at all and we’re just going to pick people based entirely on coding for race” in a secret session that violated Virginia’s open meeting laws just as much as it violated the law requiring that magnet school admissions be based on test scores. I know that Atif Qarni is lying because his lips are moving, so when he says “we aren’t banning accelerated math” you can start placing your bets that he’s working to ban accelerated math. The “updated version” of the math pathways diagram linked in the article still hard-codes that these classes will be taken in “grades 8-10” and makes no reference to acceleration or taking them “in the grades appropriate for each student.” ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/171 "2021-04-27T03:42:45Z")
Here, for example, is [a study in New York (PDF!)](https://mmsdamps.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/accelerating-mathematics-achievement-using-heterogeneous-grouping.pdf) wherein they taught all students of all ability levels an accelerated curriculum in classes of mixed abilities, with additional supports for weaker students. > [@](#): > > Since the implementation of universal acceleration in heterogeneously grouped middle school mathematics classes, 99% of all initial high achievers in the post-acceleration cohorts have passed a trigonometry course and regents examination, and 965 have passed a precalculus course. Before universal acceleration, the corresponding percentages were 89% and 81%. It is noteworthy that _every_ African American or Latino high-achieving student in one of the post-universal-acceleration cohorts has successfully passed a trigonometry course, has passed a New York State regents exam that measures skills in trigonometry and advanced algebra, and has gone on to study precalculus. This is in contrast with the pre-universal-acceleration-of-all-years, when only 69% of high-achieving students of color completed precalculus. Do you have specific criticisms or refutations of this study, or other studies showing opposing results? ---
**Author:** ![snoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@snoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snoe)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/172 "2021-04-27T05:10:35Z")
> [@ZosterSandstorm](#): > > Why the well-poisoning Like, um, “educrats?” I’m not really interested in getting into the minutiae of how VA is canceling higher math any more than how, exactly, Joe Biden’s gonna ration our beef, but I do have to say it is very rich for the OP to talk about bias and well-poisoning here. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/173 "2021-04-27T05:37:03Z")
I hope you’re ready to not be surprised! ---
**Author:** ![ZosterSandstorm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ZosterSandstorm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZosterSandstorm)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/174 "2021-04-27T11:54:48Z")
> [@snoe](#): > > Like, um, “educrats?” > > I’m not really interested in getting into the minutiae of how VA is canceling higher math any more than how, exactly, Joe Biden’s gonna ration our beef, but I do have to say it is very rich for the OP to talk about bias and well-poisoning here. I make no secret of the fact that I’m advocating a position. If the reporter in the news section of the _Washington Post_ has the same tone as my posts arguing for one side of an issue on a “debates” message board then she and she alone has a very big problem. ---
**Author:** ![ZosterSandstorm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ZosterSandstorm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZosterSandstorm)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/175 "2021-04-27T11:59:44Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > Do you have specific criticisms or refutations of this study, or other studies showing opposing results? There’s plenty of studies showing all sorts of different outcomes from different acceleration approaches that one can find by doing little more than googling terms such as “math acceleration study.” I like the idea in the study you cited of holding everyone to high standards (as opposed to the Virginia proposal in which everyone will be forced into low standards). I would be interested in finding out more about how they got student and parental buy-in to the program and avoided some of the issues like people insisting that “I, specifically, am ‘just bad at math’ so it’s unfair to make me specifically do math, but don’t ever suggest that people have different capabilities in general, that’s racist” or middle-aged people who consider themselves hard-working and intelligent complaining that homework drools. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/176 "2021-04-27T12:30:18Z")
> [@slash2k](#): > > Do you have specific criticisms or refutations of this study, or other studies showing opposing results? That’s a really interesting study. One piece that’s really important is that they supported this universal-acceleration approach with several means, including offering additional support for struggling students in classes that capped at 8 students. This program ain’t cheap. That said, if it works, we should fund it. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/177 "2021-04-27T13:41:58Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > classes that capped at 8 students Wow, I didn’t spot that part. I bet you could improve results using almost any teaching method if classes were capped at 8 students. I did notice that this study dropped the ‘standard’ classes and offered advanced instruction to all students, unlike the Virginia proposal which does the opposite. That’s a big difference. ---
**Author:** ![ZosterSandstorm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ZosterSandstorm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZosterSandstorm)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/178 "2021-04-27T13:43:39Z")
Some of Jaime Escalante’s classes had more than 50 students. All else being equal, smaller class sizes might help, but they’re not the end-all given that all else, such as teacher quality and student motivation, is far from equal. They’re a big priority for groups that get direct economic and political benefit from hiring more teachers regardless of need or qualifications, of course. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/179 "2021-04-27T13:51:55Z")
> [@snoe](#): > > I’m not really interested in getting into the minutiae of how VA is canceling higher math any more than how, exactly, Joe Biden’s gonna ration our beef, but I do have to say it is very rich for the OP to talk about bias and well-poisoning here. Even if @ZosterSandstorm is doing the same thing, that doesn’t excuse the journalist doing it or make the article any less biased. It’s really not a good argument. ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396/180 "2021-04-27T14:39:14Z")
> [@ZosterSandstorm](#): > > There’s plenty of studies showing all sorts of different outcomes from different acceleration approaches that one can find by doing little more than googling terms such as “math acceleration study.” Okay, well then let’s see some of these studies. Please show us one or two that you found particularly persuasive or compelling. > [@ZosterSandstorm](#): > > (as opposed to the Virginia proposal in which everyone will be forced into low standards). No matter how many times you keep repeating it, this part still is not proven. What, SPECIFICALLY, is the current standard of achievement expected of high-, low-, and middle-achieving students, and what will be the standard of achievement expected under the new proposal? What skills, for example, are average 8th-graders expected to know now that will not be taught in the pathways, or will not be taught until later? > [@ZosterSandstorm](#): > > “I, specifically, am ‘just bad at math’ so it’s unfair to make me specifically do math, but don’t ever suggest that people have different capabilities in general, that’s racist” Who in this thread said either of these things? Look at the study I cited above in New York, where high-achievers of color were nearly 50% more likely to go on to precalc if they were NOT tracked only with other high achievers. How do you explain that result? The way I see it, if the tracking system is failing a big percentage of HIGH achieving students, the ones who in theory should see the biggest advantages, that is an argument in favor of ditching the tracking system. How do you see it? (I will remind you that _YOU_ were the one who said that people weren’t good at math only because they were from families that didn’t value education, and I have not forgotten that you called people like me “dullards” and “impaired.”) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/virginia-educrats-drop-the-hammer-on-advanced-math-education/940396.md?page=10)