Miscalculating Math
Students鈥� math scores hit historically low levels on national assessments during the pandemic. A big reason why: students鈥� poor grasp of statistics and geometry. But scores began to slip in statistics and geometry long before the pandemic, driven in part by reform-related shifts in math instruction that pushed those topics to the back of the textbook or into higher grades. The problem: Students need data skills to land high-paying jobs in an evolving economy. Now the push is on to rebalance the equation for math instruction. This enterprise package examines the reasons behind students鈥� faltering math skills, employers鈥� increasingly urgent calls for workers with data skills, the kinds of math skills need for high-paying jobs in data science, and efforts afoot to find places to wedge geometry and statistics into an overcrowded math curriculum.
Are Students Getting All the Math They Need to Succeed?Advocates say reforms in math teaching are pushing out statistics and geometry and driving a drop in students' math scores.
