Beware Leftists Talking “Conversations”
By Mitch Berg
In 2010, Governor Dayton pledged to make education his top priority.
In 2018, Walz did the same
And after the spending of billions of dollars – much of it extracted with the same exploitive gaslighting and logrolling that were the calling cards of both Dayton and Walz’s gubernatorial races – the results are…
…well, predictable:
Math scores on the biggest statewide exam have plummeted for six straight years, troubling some education officials and teachers — and prompting deep discussions about how to teach math in a more holistic way.
Last year, just 55% of students met state standards on the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments, or MCAs, a slide of six percentage points in just over a decade. The decline spans all racial groups, and has diverged from the trend in reading scores, which have largely remained flat.
A smart government and bureaucracy would think in terms of, perhaps, inviting different people to the “conversation”.
October 14th, 2019 at 7:03 am
What do math scores have to do with education spending?
The purpose of education spending is to enhance the wealth, power and privilege of Education Minnesota. FULL STOP.
October 14th, 2019 at 7:27 am
No disagreement with Greg, but this is what they want to spend the money on to improve math scores (they were mentioned in an article in the Strib the other day). I’ll bet they aren’t cheap.
… yes, to my shame, I read an article in the Strib that wasn’t about sports.
October 14th, 2019 at 7:52 am
“Instead, schools are broadening the idea of what it means to learn math, integrating the subject into coursework and hands-on lessons focused on problem-solving and the real-world implications of math.”
Something tells me that this doesn’t mean factoring polynomials.
October 14th, 2019 at 8:08 am
“plummeted for six straight years, troubling some education officials and teachers”
troubling only some well isn’t that precious.
October 14th, 2019 at 8:59 am
When that many students fail to meet the standards despite spending years being taught according to the best methods by professional, licensed educators, there is only one possible conclusion: plainly, the standards were set too high and must be adjusted downward.
What? That’s how we solved the problem of not enough females becoming fire fighters, not enough minorities becoming doctors, not enough indigents becoming home owners. Why not students passing math tests?
b
October 14th, 2019 at 9:14 am
This is where we are now. Entering a dark age. It is indeed troubling.
True, social media is impressive. The internet gives us instant access to global knowledge. We are a more tolerant society, at least in theory. But Facebook is not the Hoover Dam, and Twitter is not the Panama Canal.
October 14th, 2019 at 10:11 am
Maybe they could try woke math like Seattle.
https://www.k12.wa.us/sites/default/files/public/socialstudies/pubdocs/Math%20SDS%20ES%20Framework.pdf?fbclid=IwAR1OcZliNSdEoiGpBstEzJw62re-wpQWXRSQeq7Ul78PH1C06YZp-e6Ii6A
October 14th, 2019 at 10:18 am
I’m surprised none of you guys twigged the “adaptive tests”, wherein the test questions get progressively easier as more wrong answers are made.
This dumbing down is insidious; it’s evil.
October 14th, 2019 at 12:19 pm
PM nails it. They went to what we would have previously called the “New Math”, hence we get the results thereof. As a math and engineering TA in college, I could always tell whose elementary school/teachers didn’t stress basic arithmetic–and I had to kill their dreams of a STEM career in the process. In the same way, as a homeschool dad, the first thing I look at when my kids have trouble with math is whether they’ve done their math facts. Always.
October 14th, 2019 at 1:56 pm
Don’t tell me that pouring money into education doesn’t help. I’m sure the declining math scores are just a statistical aberration, but we’d need someone who can do statistics to be sure. But look – we pour money into sex ed, and STDs are way up!
October 14th, 2019 at 2:46 pm
NW: Yes, STDs are way up in a world where one of the big hitters, HPV, has a vaccine that most young people are taking. We are talking seriously skyrocketing consequences that ought to sober even the most earnest proponents of “comprehensive” sex education.
October 14th, 2019 at 3:09 pm
NW, to be 100% fair the stds are way up because retirement homes and communities are a 65+ brothels basically. Now try to enjoy your next meal thinking about that 😉
October 14th, 2019 at 9:33 pm
Look, I’ll never be a genius at math (or anything else), but anyone with an average IQ should be able to get through two semesters of calculus with a passing grade. You can do that just by memorizing rules & fitting real-world problems into mathematical concepts. If you can do A level work in English, you should be able to do at least C level work in calculus (that’s a good description of my academic career:)).