<p>100 is the median. Average is technically within one standard deviation either way.</p>
<p>The BELOW-average kids in other countries fare reasonably well in learning geometry and algebra II in junior high, but again that is because they receive much better elementary school instruction in math than is typical in the United States. </p>
<p><a href="http://math.berkeley.edu/%7Ewu/%5B/url%5D">http://math.berkeley.edu/~wu/</a> </p>
<p><a href="http://nychold.org/%5B/url%5D">http://nychold.org/</a> </p>
<p>A student's IQ scores shouldn't be taken as a predictor of a hard upper limit on the student's achievement absent proof that the student is receiving OPTIMAL instruction, which few American students receive. The international comparisons show what is possible for below-average students in other countries. Take a good look at the charts showing the ranges of scores in different countries in the TIMSS data links I have already posted to this thread: average students from some other countries score at the "gifted" level of United States students, and correspondingly their below-average students fully make it to United States average levels. More progress is possible here.</p>
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<p>They do in other countries... :rolleyes:</p>
<p>I hope you are not trying to tell us that an average American kid is much dumber than an average Romanian kid? ;) Somehow, all (non-LD) Koreans, Romanians or Ukrainians are capable of taking Algebra I in 5-6 grade, and most Americans are not? And you are saying, exactly half of Americans could not pass Alg II -- ever? :eek: Na-ah... I think American kids are no different. Like tokenadult said, they just need proper instruction, and their average IQ will not get in the way of them becoming architects or psychologists.</p>
<p>Oh, and about the tracking issue (or excuse?)... That the other countries are tracking, and we give education to everybody, etc etc. The dropout rate in the U.S. is now what, about 1/3 ? So, all those kids -- a third of population -- are they "everybody" or "nobody"?</p>
<p>And actually, there IS tracking in the U.S., too. What about the vocational or technical schools? How are they different from the vocational track in Germany?</p>
<p>In a lot of foreign countries, going to school and passing, as well as graduating from high school, are sort of regarded as one's "civic duty." That's why the literacy rate is so much higher in countries like Canada, Korea, Japan, and European countries.</p>
<p>" you see a problem, would you run away from it while you are a student"</p>
<p>Of course not! Use a calculator.</p>
<p>One problem I saw when my D was in middle school--if kids don't understand something in math (and it could be in other subjects also, but I am only involved with math)--they just throw up their hands. </p>
<p>One kid told me that she didn't understand a math concept. I asked her--did you read the book? did you go in for help from your teacher? did you ask someone like me for help? Answer was no, no, no. If it isn't put into her IV, she didn't put out any effort.</p>
<p>The other problem I see a lot--the computational skills of some low math performers (and some high to moderately intelligent kids who are mediocre math performers) are so spotty as to practically doom them at test taking time. I think they could go from "fail" to at least "barely pass" if they drilled, drilled, and drilled their math facts. After all, you can understand how to factor a quadratic equation--but if you multiply 8 x 7 and get 54, you get the answer wrong on these mutiple choice tests. But drilling math facts in high school is so boring--and high schools don't have the time or inclination to do that kind of remedial work. And the kids don't choose to do it. . .</p>
<p>I agree that many kids can learn algebra & geometry in lower grades and have recommended such to our principal. </p>
<p>However, haven't we all met people that are "dumber than a rock". How are those people suppose to learn higher math?</p>
<p>Marmat--</p>
<p>There is no difference in the vocational track in my county. For a Baltimore County HS diploma, they need the algebra. There is no other math in the course handbook for the county--I have it here, and I checked. So going through culinary arts, or auto mechanics, or whatever does not exempt you from the higher math. (and some may reasonably argue that it shouldn't--but I think it's a worthy topic for discussion)</p>
<p>i would be happy if our district/state required 4 yrs of math- whatever math that turned out to be
but our district has "intergrated" math- which is math taught in a spiral and important concepts are left out-
I think that most students however- if taught concepts properly and not allowed to move ahead until they retain them should be able to take through algebra.</p>
<p>different strokes for different folks. Its all in the numbers, and it is a numbers game. To find the math genius, the engineer,the doctor, you have to not only provide the coursess but also the numbers of students to find those few. </p>
<p>The many students that are dropping out are dropping out maybe because the course work is inapplicatable to their attitudes and dreams. Neither of which I believe you can teach successfully in a school. You may reach a few but not all.</p>
<p>Here's an interesting article titled "The Democratization of Mathematics", some of you have probably already read it. It has an interesting part in it about how the USA can score fairly low in math yet still have a very wealthy economy. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.maa.org/Ql/pgs21_31.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.maa.org/Ql/pgs21_31.pdf</a></p>
<p>Here is a quote from that article: "Clearly, algebra II is the threshold mathematics course taken by people who eventually get good jobs in the top half of the earnings distribution." </p>
<p>I am in no way opposed to math education for anybody -- believe me, I have taken plenty of math and so will my children. I just don't think a sizeable portion of the population is equipped to take Algebra II. Yesterday was a lovely spring day and I was out walking my dog and saw the following in my neighborhood: lawn service guys spraying someone's yard, guys cleaning out gutters, yard maintenance people digging out bushes, painters, and roofing guys repairing shingles. All these people are a valuable part of our local economy performing necessary services. I'm not saying these particular people can't pass Algebra II, but why should they have to to get a high school diploma? The guy that I use for painting jobs does an excellent job and makes a pretty good living and when it comes time to pay, he hands me a piece of paper with my total written in pencil and I pay it.</p>
<p>Izzie:</p>
<p>How many of the people who spray lawns, repair roof shingles, dig bushes, etc... are immigrants (possibly illegal)? In my neck of the woods, only the front person can speak decent English. I have not checked anyone's math credentials: I would not even be able to make myself understood.</p>
<p>Oh, and I just read about ordering food from McDonald's via an operator located thousands of miles away. In this case, it was in HI. How long will it be before fast-food restaurants relocated their phone operators to India, thus taking away even more low-paying jobs that do not require Algebra?</p>
<p>I think that BEFORE we impose a requirement of Alg II for all hs graduates, we need to make sure that the math programs during the lower grade years are teaching kids well enough. </p>
<p>If we just impose the Alg II req't w/o improving math ed overall, we are just going to have a bunch of kids "drop out" and go to community colleges where Alg II is not required for admission OR just get their GED.</p>
<p>We can't set kids up for failure by demanding requirements when math ed is so wanting.</p>
<p>Maybe I just live in a completely different culture from many of you. I live in the Midwest, we have very few illegal immigrants. We have migrant workers that come through in the summer and work on some produce farms, but I don't know their immigration status. The people that I see in my neighborhood are from family-owned businesses that have been around for a long time. We don't have cheap labor here. I live in a college town, so there are plenty of very intelligent people here, however there are plenty of people who aren't. We have lots of working class people and we also have a "ghetto" section of town. There are a lot of international people but they're mostly affiliated with the university. We have it all and they all go to the same high school.</p>
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<blockquote> <blockquote> <p>How long will it be before fast-food restaurants relocated their phone operators to India, thus taking away even more low-paying jobs that do not require Algebra? <<<</p> </blockquote> </blockquote>
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<p>In a different way, this is already happening. I went to a fast food place where people are to go to a touch pad, enter their order & pay with a debit/credit card. NO person is used at all in the ordering process.</p>
<p>We certainly have seen the "self check out" registers at various national stores -- those surely eliminate low paying (no alg II) jobs.</p>
<p>I would bet that the migrant workers are illegal
In seattle we have a lot of illegal workers.
My neighbor who works in the fishing/boat industry says that many ( most) of the workers are Mexican and are illegal, and that many would not be permitted to gain citizenship because of criminal activity in their home country.
"Everyone" apparently packs- and considering the rate of drug use, prior criminal behavior and carrying weapons, it isn't the safest environment for anyone</p>
<p>I'm not saying we don't have illegal immigrants here, it is just not pervasive like it seems to be on the west coast. On Monday, when it was "walk out of school and demonstrate to support your local illegal immigrant" day, it was all rich kids from ultra-liberal families and very few actual immigrants. Same thing with the college students, and it barely made the local news.</p>
<p>Well, I live on the East Coast. Nail salons are operated by Vietnamese who barely speak English; floor sanders are either Vietnamese or Latin Americans. Painters come from all over Latin America and Ireland (you can see I've been doing some renovation :)) Taxi drivers are Haitians and Moroccans; a lot of motel operators seem to be named Patel, and so on and so forth. Not all, of course, are illegal; and some are in fact very well educated, well beyond Algebra II.
The point is that with immigration, both legal and illegal, and the outsourcing of low-and mid-level skilled labor and the replacement of human beings by machines (and you can bet these machines operate at a level above Algebra II), many of the jobs that our kids would have gotten without much math education are disappearing. </p>
<p>I recently saw a presentation about farming in the Midwest. The machines are worth a couple of hunded of thousand of dollars each and are highly technical; running the farms require computer savvy; marketing the products involves participation in the global economy. This not Grapes of Wrath country. Meanwhile, factory work is disappearing.</p>
<p>My cousins are mostly farmers in the Midwest, whose parents' schooling ceased after eighth grade. All my uncles and aunts are avid readers, and certainly have far more knowledge than most adults who have only eighth-grade educations, and most all my cousins have college degrees and run their farms in a very high-tech fashion. </p>
<p>I once would have thought it was unimaginable to hear Spanish spoken regularly here in Minnesota, but most roofers, grounds maintenance workers, fast food servers, and other blue-collar service workers here these days are first-generation immigrants from Mexico, doing jobs that in my generation were done by high school kids or recent high school graduates. I too think that international trends are such that everyone had best maximize skills in as many areas as possible (math definitely being included among those areas) to be sure of steady, gainful employment over the next few decades.</p>
<p>Actually, my son has a friend whose last name is Patel, whose family owns the Super 8 motel. They're not illegal, the kid drives a Lexus and his parents made him drop swim team because he wasn't getting all A's. He also got a speeding ticket for going 105 on a 35 mph street during lunchtime. I know that's neither here nor there, just an interesting fact about this kid, whose parents are probably not quite sure what to do with him.</p>
<p>Algebra II seems to the indicator of whether a kid can handle college work or not. Great, require it of all college bound students. If a student has no intentions of going to college, then it shouldn't be required although the student is certainly welcome to take it. Offer a class (consumer or business math) that is more practical and usable to that student. The student may have the intelligence to pass the class but not the motivation or aptitude, leading to dropping out of high school because of just one class, Algebra II. </p>
<p>I know about farming in the Midwest -- my uncle and his sons own a huge farm and grow corn, soybeans plus produce pork (very specialized low fat pork) and some beef (not large scale). My uncle and my cousins have degrees in agriculture, they know how to run the combines and other equipment plus they have the necessary computer knowledge. This is the family farm that my mother grew up on. However, they don't run it on their own. They hire numerous farm hands, and they didn't hire them for their algebra skills. More and more farms are run by corporations now too, so have lots of employees with various skills.</p>
<p>Yes, the good, high-paying jobs require math skills. But there are plenty of people around who are just not college material but are certainly high school material and shouldn't have a high school diploma out of their reach.</p>