KnowHow2Go has a new college access campaign encouraging kids to take tough classes like Algebra II and Foreign Languages. Think KISS x Schwarzenegger, but with Mr. Rogers' intentions. I'm going to hide under my bed now.
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Must See TV! Schwarzenegger Doppelganger Promotes Algebra II!
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But Conan, I mean, Arnie taught kindergarten too! Was "Kindergarten Cop" tongue in cheek, that teachers spend most of their policing time?
This has some interesting real-life tie-ins with Calyfornea where the Governator works.
In an attempt to make all students college ready, algebra was made a requirement for high school graduation under the former governor (Gray Davis), and students have to pass an exit exam.
In one of those examples of standards falling short of the need, more students are having to take remedial math as they enter college in spite of this (http://tinyurl.com/5kmg63). This is because colleges have decided that students need to know Algebra II/Calculus so that students will be able to do higher level analysis.
There was some discussion (http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?p=752) around Deborah Meier's point that it is that it's statistics that need to be emphasized because you get more analysis for the number crunching required.
And just to leave it on a provocative point, here is a link to the post in the Chronicle of Higher Education suggesting maybe all those kids shouldn't be going to college: http://tinyurl.com/658ddr.
Loved the video, and I like the idea of urging kids to take the hard classes, but there was a recent newspaper piece that points up the problems with trying to prepare all students for college level math by making it mandatory...
Education - Despite high school algebra focus, more students need remedial college math - sacbee.com. It looks like they set the bar too low, because colleges now want students ready for calculus classes (something they seemed to be aiming for back when I started college in the mid-1980s, but solved by offering watered down classes in social science stats--thank god).
Sure to add fat to the fire is this piece from Chronicle of Higher Education...
America's Most Overrated Product: the Bachelor's Degree - Chronicle.com
Which questions college for the lower 40% of high school graduates.
And, there has been discussion about whether we we do better to emphasize statistics, rather than having all roads lead to calculus here...
dy/dan » Blog Archive » Deborah Meier Is Right About Math