My daughter did take algebra 2 and passed with a B. However, she didn’t score high enough on the ACT math section so had a math requirement in college. They had a placement test (but she never took it) and she would have had to take three remedial math courses (got to pay for them, no credit) and then 2 math classes including calculus. The requirements changed while she was in school and she probably only would have had to take one, but still the 3 remedial courses.
Instead, she took one course that met the requirement at our local state college over the summer. They let her skip the remedial classes because one of that school’s exceptions was having at least a hs gpa of 2.8 (and hers was much higher). She got an A.
So, even if she gets into college without the math, she may need it to get out. We made a big mistake by not having daughter retake the ACT to get a higher math grade. She also could not get into the school of education because of the low math score. Someone above mention being a early education major, but that wasn’t possible for my daughter. Check the requirements to get into the school but also the major she wants.
Obviously, someone going into elementary school teaching needs to be comfortable with enough math to be able to teach it to the students. That does not have to be a high level (unless encountering a math prodigy doing calculus in third grade or whatever), but the teacher does need to be good enough in math to teach it to the students and grade their work.
But also, math skills and comfort with math can be useful in general. Consider the posters on these forums or people in general who have difficulty calculating an unweighted high school GPA, or understanding the difference between tax liability and tax refund?
As a current teacher, I did not truly understand the WHY of math until my Math Method courses. I was lucky enough to be able to memorize. A student with Dyscalcula may not be so lucky. I do think there are many ways to skin a cat, though, and finding an amazing tutor who understands a math LD can go a long way. Someone who can teach with modeling, visuals, help the student understand WHY can make a huge difference.
No, a student who is looking at Early Childhood Education may not be concerned with pre-calc, but Stats? OMG, yes. Education is data driven. Get her used to looking at, comparing, and seeing patterns in numbers. Understanding graphs and the implications to instruction is most important. She needs to understand the implications of these types of numbers and Standard Deviations.
I don’t know the grad requirements in VA. I do know where I live it’s 4 years of Math. I’d be looking to make sure D had a enough credits/requirements to graduate. As long as that is the case, while she may have to take remedial math in college, with tutors and a plan in place she should get through.
Much luck to her! I hope she can find that one teacher who helps her find her stride so she can feel successful.
I’m confused by the plan to have your DD skip Algebra 2 and take College Algebra instead, even though College Algebra is generally considered the equivalent of Algebra 3 and has Algebra 2 as a prerequisite. At most colleges, Beginning and Intermediate Algebra are remedial (Algebra 1 & 2) and then the next step is either Precalc in one semester, or spread over two semesters as College Algebra and Trig. So I think she may have a hard time getting through College Algebra without having successfully completed Algebra 2.
Have you looked at the Gen Ed requirements at some of the schools she’s interested in? For example, the minimum math course at our state universities is a sort of Math Concepts course that has Algebra 2 (Intermediate Algebra) as a prerequisite, but it is “lighter” than a College Algebra course, and tends to combine algebra review with basic stats, probability, and other topics. If you can get a sense of what the minimum math level is to meet graduation requirements at the target colleges, you can focus on getting to that level (which could even be below College Algebra).
Since she hasn’t been tested yet, you need to prepare for a couple of possibilities. First, there is the possibility that your D20 doesn’t have dyscalculia. Second, even if she does, I have personally found it difficult to get accommodations for a LD diagnosed in high school (my D20’s was diagnosed her sophomore year and we’ve never been able to get her full officials accommodations). There seems, at least in our experience, to be a perception that if a child managed to make it this far without accommodations that they don’t really need them.
The main reason why algebra II is required is that it is pivotal, not just for advanced math classes, but also for the high-tech, STEM-oriented demands of just about every profession there is. Now, even manufacturing jobs that don’t require a college degree require a certain level of math proficiency. There’s no escaping it for the next generation.
If she avoiding CC because they only offer a two year degree and/or the “community” part of the game, she may be interested in a 4 year degree from a technical college. Florida and Washington state both have 4 year programs (bachelor of applied science) targeted at specific careers.
North Seattle College offers a BAS in early childhood education. I don’t know if algebra II is required but they will offer a lot of remedial courses in math to get her there.
Thanks all for the many responses and posts…I’ll try to address everyone’s posts…
@tutumom2001 I’m almost certain my D20 has Dyscalculia based on her other documented LDs (ADHD, Poor Working Memory, Executive Function issues) which have been documented since well before HS. Additional testing done at the beginning of HS documented General Anxiety Disorder…no surprise that this started in HS as stress level increased - she had an anxiety panic attack the night before an SOL and scared the life out of me. She has had IEP/504 accommodations since Kindergarten. While her Educational Evaluation Reports do not specifically use the term Dyscalculia, the report clearly notes her deficiencies in math.
Most people have never heard of Dyscalculia; I myself did not learn of it until recently. If you follow my D20’s grades you will clearly see the low performance in math throughout the years. D+ in Algebra 1, C- in Geometry. Unfortunately, at the time…our school did not offer a remedial course between Algebra 1 and Algebra 2, since she didn’t fail Algebra 1 she did not qualify for summer school to repeat Algebra 1 either. So we were stuck with having to go straight to Algebra 2.
Her counselor also did not recommend that she take Chemistry due to her math disability and luckily they removed Chemistry from the graduation requirement at her HS. Instead she took Active Physics which is a course given to those with weak math skills and she earned a B; this year she is in Geosystems earning a B+.
Also of note…I’ve learned that the sequential difficulties that make math challenging for those with Dyscalculia transfer over to foreign languages…gee…so that explains the C grades in French…again, despite tutoring and help from mom who speaks French and tried endlessly to speak to her at home! She also took French for 2 years in Middle School and it would have counted as a HS language credit, but since she earned a C in Middle School I thought having her retake French 1 would give her an easy A/B…but nope…still got a C and now only 2 language credits. She refused to take another year of language and I can’t blame her as she really does struggle.
@blossom D20 has always scraped by in math…due to every kind of tutoring available since elementary school…from group tutoring to KUMON to very expensive private tutoring by one of the best math tutors in our area. While taking Algebra 2 the private math tutor was coming 2-3 times a week at $80/hour…and she was still failing! That’s when I knew something was inherently wrong. So we did a WF for Algebra 2 so it would not affect her GPA. This year we thought taking Computer Science to get her required math credit for graduation would work; unfortunately…with Dyscalculia…the sequential difficulties that make math challenging for those with Dyscalculia transfer to Computer Science too…she’s currently failing it…and she’s been staying after school for help and getting tutored as well. At this point I’ll be happy if she ends up with a D- in the class, so long as she can pass and get the darn math credit. We still plan to have her take the newly offered remedial course on Algebra, Functions, and Data Analysis her senior year so she’ll have another math credit.
@Corraleno – based on my research I’ve found that in Virginia at least…College Algebra is seen as more of a remedial course - you can see the College Algebra CLEP Exam contents here: https://clep.collegeboard.org/science-and-mathematics/college-algebra. The College Algebra CLEP exam covers material that’s usually taught in a one-semester college course in algebra. In fact, even if someone passes the CLEP exam, no Virginia college accepts the College Algebra CLEP for college math credit. The only reason I want my D20 to take an online College Algebra course is to show that she has put in the effort to try to learn Algebra despite her math LD. She will struggle to get accepted into a a school in Virginia without Algebra 2 on her HS transcript…but showing that she has done everything possible to overcome her disability will hopefully look good on her college app.
Regarding college algebra, that typically covers more advanced material than high school algebra 2.
Here are the typical correspondences:
High School College
Algebra 1 Elementary Algebra
Geometry Plane Geometry
Algebra 2 Intermediate Algebra
(not usually offered by itself) College Algebra
(not usually offered by itself) Trigonometry
Precalculus College Algebra + Trigonometry
Calculus (less rigorous) Calculus for Business Majors
Calculus AB Calculus 1
Calculus BC Calculus 1 + Calculus 2
I think you’ll be okay at Radford and ODU, probably at UMW if she has other strong subjects.
(Do submit her act/sat at OSU/Radford since it’s not too good but definitely not bad; go test optional at UMW).
Check out requirements at Guilford, Sweet Briar, Virgina Wesleyan.
@MmeZeeZee - she’s not totally opposed to Community College (Guaranteed Admissions option) and we are looking at Richard Bland College of William and Mary too. She does not want to go that far away from home – her rule is that it must be driving distance. She doesn’t want to have to get on a plane to go home. So while we haven’t ruled out OOS schools we are sticking to border states for now (PA, MD, DE, WV, NC).
http://www.math.buffalo.edu/rur_index.html has a set of quizzes to see if the student is ready for a given math course. Use the correspondences above to map the college course names to high school course names.
Note that introductory non-calculus-based statistics (which AP statistics emulates) typically has a prerequisite of intermediate algebra or high school algebra 2. At some colleges, a special pre-statistics version of intermediate algebra is offered for students who will only take the statistics course, not more advanced math courses.
Blossom, that your job required calculus is different. Yes, MBA’s and MD’s require it. But someone who is severely discalculic, or even, as you put it " math-phobic," probably isn’t going into those careers. Sometimes on CC it seems like everyone in the world is going to go to Wall Street or into medicine, but I know that you know that isn’t remotely the truth.
Both my kids were social science majors, and Stats wasn’t offered in our HS till long after they graduated. That would have been much more helpful to them than Algebra 2 or Trig or Calculus. And they did fine on those courses, so this is not special pleading on my part. Just an awareness that not everyone needs the same skill set. Which is what math is, a tool. There are other tools. For lots of folks, the Alg 2/Trig/calc sequence is not the tool they need.
As noted above, introductory non-calculus-based statistics or AP statistics commonly lists intermediate algebra or high school algebra 2 as a prerequisite.
Garland, the OP has since explained the D’s situation, so I now agree that the algebra sequence is likely a non starter for her. I still think that many kids who don’t like math, hate math, are terrible at math CAN learn math beyond the level which their high school’s typically think they can AND they can leave open some doors professionally by doing so.
At my own kids schools- generally pretty reasonable places- I observed that girls were much less likely to be pushed or challenged in math than boys. And that parents of girls were ok saying “my kid is terrible at math” whereas they’d be calling to complain if it were a son. I have kids of both genders and saw that strong math skills in girls was generally attributed to “she works hard” when strong math skills in boys were described as “he’s a real math kid”.
None of this is relevant to the OP’s D- who genuinely has a disorder. But I look at scores of high school girls whose parents have given up on them vis a vis math-- and I know that they have closed the door on many, many professional opportunity.
A neighbor of mine- who claims her D is terrible at math-- thinks “oh well, she’ll go into marketing”. Marketing these days is ALL math (I hire dozens of marketing people a year and have hired hundreds in my career). At it’s most complex- it’s big data/data mining. At its least complex- it still requires analyzing charts, tables, understanding a regression analysis (not doing one- but understanding the implications). The days when the marketing department of a big company existed to pick the colors of the company logo- kiss those days goodbye.
I don’t mean to be argumentative-- but I’m willing to bet that in your own kid’s HS you observed that girls were not pushed in math if they decided “I hate math”. Boys are usually encouraged to “at least try the harder class”, girls are given a pass.
And we wonder why- 15 years later- women are earning 80 cents to the dollar vs. men…
^Honestly? I didn’t see that so much at kids’ school. I will agree that the top boys all took computer programming (including my S, and the girls did not–and we had a really first rate program which was unusual in our not very remarkable school) but I think that it being a low-rated school system, actualy no one was pushed on math–you either did it or didn’t (well, did it enough to graduate). Different kind of world from most CC high schools.
@scoutmom2002 – I don’t think there is value in your daughter taking a college algebra course just for the purpose of showing the college she is willing to work hard. With her grades she is not going to be headed to a highly selective college – and in any case, when colleges are competitive for admission, they want to see evidence that a student will do well. Your daughter is unlikely to do well in an algebra 2 level course when she barely passed algebra 1 and geometry – that’s only piling on more difficulty when she hasn’t mastered the introductory level concepts she needs.
So focus on her needs, now, while in high school — and encourage her to take courses where she will be able to succeed. Given her array of difficulties, it’s not fair to her – and she doesn’t benefit from-- courses where she has to struggle just to keep up. And post-high school it’s not such a bad thing if she starts at community college - there is absolutely no value whatsoever in setting her up for failure in college. So focus on a college and career path where it is reasonably possible that she can succeed.
She will have options-- it’s just that trying to make her become something she isn’t won’t work… and trying to make her look like that something she can’t be isn’t going to work either.
@blossom — I did some googling, and there are plenty of MBA programs that don’t require calculus. My kids both have MPA’s – they were required to have stats, not calculus. I never took calculus or stats, and ended up getting a JD. I’m not trying to debate what’s preferable… simply pointing out what is possible.
@ucbalumnus us – I don’t know about all schools, but I do know that Columbia offers a very basic stats class that doesn’t even require intermediate algebra. (Stats 1001, described as “A friendly introduction to statistical concepts and reasoning with emphasis on developing statistical intuition rather than on mathematical rigor”) I assume that if an Ivy offers that course that many less selective universities offer something similar – these are courses geared to giving a basic overview and satisfying general ed quantitative reasoning requirements.
But the point is simply that the OP’s daughter can find a path that doesn’t require higher math.
Or she may find that she succeeds in math with practical applications, like finance, in college, like my daughter did. Don’t give up yet, OP. I know several people who got C grades in math in high school and A grades in college. It does happen, even when you least expect it.