Math Skills Are Essential and Essentially Failing in US
Friday, October 10th, 2008Anyone can tell you, mathematics and science go hand in hand. Even when you don’t think that math is going to come into play, it is math that often times allows even social or “soft” scientists to quantify data and in turn interpret results. I remember my chemistry and physics classes, and math was crucial to those classes. So a new study coming out that details how mathematics is slipping among students in the United States is all that much disturbing for its implications in terms of science.
From the New York Times today:
The study suggests that while many girls have exceptional talent in math — the talent to become top math researchers, scientists and engineers — they are rarely identified in the United States. A major reason, according to the study, is that American culture does not highly value talent in math, and so discourages girls — and boys, for that matter — from excelling in the field. The study will be published Friday in Notices of the American Mathematical Society.
“We’re living in a culture that is telling girls you can’t do math — that’s telling everybody that only Asians and nerds do math,” said the study’s lead author, Janet E. Mertz, an oncology professor at the University of Wisconsin, whose son is a winner of what is viewed as the world’s most-demanding math competitions. “Kids in high school, where social interactions are really important, think, ‘If I’m not an Asian or a nerd, I’d better not be on the math team.’ Kids are self selecting. For social reasons they’re not even trying.”
I saw plenty of this during my school days. I was great at math, on a math team, and also on the science olympiad team. I was also in the top-tier of the math “sections” within my grade, but I bring this up not to brag, but simply to give you some background on where I am coming from, the inside, as it were. I never felt nerdy for being good at math, but then I was never one to really care much for what anyone would think about me, in so much as to call me a nerd. I loved doing math problems. I thought they were fun.
However, I also remember sixth grade being the grade that suddenly all the girls in my grade became really bad at math. Hmm, what else happens in sixth grade? Right around age 11 or 12? Hmm, could it be puberty? Those same girls that had always been in my math sections were more interested in boys than math. And a girl cannot be smarter than a boy in math!!!! So many girls kind of self-lobotomized in order to get a boyfriend. They never came back to my math classes…
This is also from the NY Times article.
Dr. Mertz asserts that the new study is the first to examine data from the most difficult math competitions for young people, including the USA and International Mathematical Olympiads for high school students, and the Putnam Mathematical Competition for college undergraduates. For winners of these competitions, the Michael Phelpses and Kobe Bryants of math, getting an 800 on the math SAT is routine. The study found that many students from the United States in these competitions are immigrants or children of immigrants from countries where education in mathematics is prized and mathematical talent is thought to be widely distributed and able to be cultivated through hard work and persistence.
Ironically, another article in the NYT talked of the class war vis a vis Sarah Palin and her “sixpack” of mental skills. I found this to be appropriate, as it is all kit and kaboodle of what is going on in the US lately.
We think it is cool to be stupid.
How frightening for the US. There is nothing wrong with being smart and being good at math. Trust me, girls, I have never had a hard time getting a date by showing some intelligence. The cool guys are actually attracted to the smart girls, not the dumb ones. But then that argument only serves to underscore the fact that most girls are more worried about getting a date than an A on that algebra test.
This issue goes deeper than class-bias or even gender. Despite the fact that the United States has a bad case of the “exceptional”, our students in general do not want to stand out or strive for achievement in school other than school sports. This is a fundamental problem in the American culture, as the aforementioned study suggests.
mathematics, science, education, students, school, math, New York Times, United States
