Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

This seems such an obvious thing to me, and I'm not even in the field of Education. I agree with everything the writer wrote and found myself nodding repeatedly, thinking, it's obvious.

So why can't our so-called professionals see this too? Taking away learning opportunities from kids does them no good!

I remember once when I was in 9th grade and my elder brother was a sophomore in college. I found a textbook of his titled "Matrices and Determinants" (or something to that effect), for one of his courses. I picked it up and started reading it. After a few pages I had some questions, asked my dad. He didn't blink and just helped me out. Soon I had finished a couple of chapters and had learned more about matrices, determinants, etc. than I would ever learn in High School. Nobody told me not to read it; they just helped me along whenever I needed the help.

I can't even imagine how toxic this discouragement would be to a curious mind!

> select kids (perhaps based on prior performance in math classes, or overall GPA) to opt them into the class.

That's how it works now, pretty much everywhere. Your 7th grade teacher recommends you to take the 8th grade algebra class based on your performance (or, at least, their interpretation of your performance)

The question is, where do you draw the line that qualifies someone to take 8th grade algebra? Who do you let in when there is 1 seat left and 3 eligible students to fill that seat? How do you make sure that the grades you are using to determine who makes the cut are accurately measuring mathematical ability of the students and not biased in some other way?

I'm not advocating for either the California or the Dallas solution to this problem, but both those school districts have identified that letting the 7th grade teachers make this placement decisions is a problem.

The author is looking at the topic from a quite narrow perspective. The reasoning 'why' what he observed is happening could be due many other reasons. I think he also misunderstood some fundamental reasons why school exists in the first place, such as functioning as a "day care" for bigger kids allowing parents to work.

The article is based on an assumption of why something was done. It is positioned in a way that it immediately invokes a reaction "how can they be this stupid". But... What if that is not what those who made these decisions actually think? If he just assumes that is the case?

I'm no expert, but maybe it would help here to do a thought experiment of "what I might be missing from the puzzle?".

Lack of resources is one thing that was mentioned here. It is not that they drop the class and do nothing else. So what was the alternative? Where are the resources put now?

I'm quite sure there are other things we are missing too. I'd like to step into those people's shoes who are making the decisions to understand better why they chose what they chose, instead of assuming what they think.

Of course, if the goal is to actually improve equality, it is really stupid. Somehow I just doubt people are that dumb. There must be something more to it that I'm missing.

I went to public school in the 2000s in South Florida and there were after school programs hosted at the schools to help with all sorts of subjects. Do these school districts not provide these services anymore?

Also, in high school & college I tutored people in mathematics (algebra and pre-calc usually). What I found is that everybody can learn anything (I truly believe this), they just need help and for people to be patient with them. What saddens me about this policy is that:

1. It feels like its giving up on students. Instead of trying to help them they're just throwing their hands up.

2. It also feels like a very lazy and uncreative solution. let's assume there are people who just can't do math. Why not create tracks for them to succeed in topics they are good at and create separate tracks for people good at math? It feels like the school districts are trying to fit everybody into the same bucket when maybe people should be put into different buckets. This is how it was in my public school system (gifted vs. honors vs. regular track) and nobody complained. Regardless of the political association (progressive or not) it feels very very lazy.

At it's very foundation liberal ideology cracks pretty badly if "Everyone is born equally capable" is false.