Interesting topic. I get a little queasy when I hear these "let's re-think education" pieces, because they tend to go one of two ways: arguing for an unrealistic level of technical achievement on a population basis ("everyone is a programmer!"; Bart Simpson: "One Chief Justice of the Supreme Court ticket and one senior's ticket") or sidestepping technical skills and arguing for over-specialization on account of more social/interdisciplinary work environments. In reality, the answer lies in the middle, with a rigorous general education program, and ample access to advanced topics early for those to whom such study is suited.
The NYT article's thrust is that graduation is a "high bar" for many students, so let's water down the standard on math to minimize retention. This is a superb philosophy if the US' national skills development goal is to achieve the sheepskin effect par excellence without any actual qualifications to show for it. But, as almost all adults are able to vote and participate in society through employment, social institutions, and reproduction, it behooves Americans to prepare their citizenry for adulthood. Part of that preparation involves honing logical and critical thinking, as well as persistence in problem solving, all easily developed through math study. Students will be far better off if educators implement existing educational standards and actually prepare the broadest possible swath of students for adulthood, rather than expecting less and creating a relatively ineffective generation of citizens.
In specific terms, these points stood out:
1. "I’m not talking about quantitative skills, critical for informed citizenship and personal finance, but a very different ballgame."
How exactly does the author expect individuals to grok basic portfolio investment strategies and intertemporal discounting without algebra? Intergenerational pension overhang is already a pressing public policy and social issue, which would be further exacerbated at a high economic and social cost if algebra training weren't mandatory. And if logical reasoning is only moderately developed, a citizen is arguably
not well equipped to make informed political and social decisions. As evidence, I cite the example of every federal government in North America.
2. "But a definitive analysis by the Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce forecasts that in the decade ahead a mere 5 percent of entry-level workers will need to be proficient in algebra or above."
Umm....no. If the referenced study is the one I think it is, its conclusions are predicated on the assumption of constant technology in industrial and occupational structure, which is patently false, and increasingly so the farther forward you project. Furthermore, the reality is that we are not educating generations for efficacy only at a 10-year endpoint, so a longer horizon is required to optimize skills development.
3. "Certification programs for veterinary technicians require algebra, although none of the graduates I’ve met have ever used it in diagnosing or treating their patients. Medical schools like Harvard and Johns Hopkins demand calculus of all their applicants, even if it doesn’t figure in the clinical curriculum, let alone in subsequent practice."
This statement also ignores the fact that many technical fields which don't employ higher level (or even high school) math on a day-to-day basis require university level math training as a gateway to conceptual understanding of the field's subject matter. Even the simple matter of assessing an animal's weight and height relies on logarithmic growth curves. The argument that rigor is used as an exclusionary criterion for entry into technical professions is laughable.
4. "More and more colleges are requiring courses in “quantitative reasoning.” In fact, we should be starting that in kindergarten."
This is called "math". *facepalm*
