Major Corporations Seek to aid in Math – Science School Dilemma

 

As the United States continues to sink lower in international education standings, especially in the critical areas of science and mathematics, a number of major corporations have begun to develop initiatives in an effort to reverse the tide.

ExxonMobil Corp. has launched a National Math and Science Initiative in an effort to recruit new teachers to the profession in mathematics and the sciences. The aim of the program is also to improve Advanced Placement test scores in these two critical academic areas. ExxonMobil began its involvement in the National Math and Science Initiative (NMSI) in 2007 with a $125 million grant, which is focused on improving math and science education in the U.S. NMSI programs are currently in 29 states. According to reports from the program, during the last three years, high school students enrolled in APTIP (Advanced Placement Training and Incentive Program) achieved a 124 percent increase in the number of exams passed in AP Math, Science, and English (MSE), compared to a 23 percent increase nationally. NMSI is also helping to close achievement gaps for minority and female students. Significant improvements have been reported for African- American as wells as Latino participants.

UTeach

One of the other components of Exxon Mobil’s initiative is to recruit new teachers for science and math and to get them to stay in the profession. The effort stems from the fact that

“the U.S. is failing to produce and retain sufficient numbers of qualified math and science teachers, which impacts the success and future of our students and the ability of our country to remain competitive in today’s global marketplace. “

In response to growing crisis in math and science, the National Math and Science Initiative (NMSI) began replicating a highly successful teacher training program, UTeach, in 2008.  The program, which recruits and trains math and science majors for careers in teaching, is transforming the way universities prepare teachers for the 21^st century.

UTeach offers a degree programs at participating colleges and universities that enables students to graduate in four years with a degree in their core subject as well as a teaching certification.  Early and intensive field teaching experience begins in students’ first semesters and is supplemented by mentoring and guidance from highly experienced master teachers, faculty and public school teachers.

UTeach now has 5,500 math and science majors enrolled in the program in nearly 30 universities across the country.  The goal is to expand the program to more than 50 campuses in the next decade, with the potential to impact more than four million students.

The results are excellent.  Approximately 90 percent of UTeach graduates go directly into teaching, with a retention rate of 82 percent after five years of teaching (compared to less than 65 percent nationally).  The program has received national recognition from the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities (APLU) and the Presidential Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) and is featured as a “best practice” program by Change the Equation, a national clearinghouse for excellence in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education. You can obtain more information about this program by going to http://www.nationalmathandscience.org/programs/uteach-program

The National Flight Academy


Another relatively new project to encourage students to excel in math and science is the National Flight Academy. The camp, for students in grades seven through twelve, is located on the grounds of the Pensacola Naval Air Station in Florida, although the Navy is not involved with the program.  The camp is funded in part, with grants from LockheedMartin and NorthrupGrumman. The program exposes participants to flight simulators that present real life aviation problems that require knowledge of math and science to solve. The price tag for this experience is high- $1250 for one week although scholarships are available. The camp will be running from June through August. Participants are dividend into groups to learn to work together to solve problems. They then compete against each other.

If you are aware of any other initiatives to help improve foundations in math and science, please email us or post a comment.

It’s Still About the Math!

 

 The great realization came in 1957 with the Soviet launching of the Sputnik satellite.  The beginnings of the “Space Race” exposed just how far behind American students were in science and math.  In an effort to deal with the blow to America’s esteem, the US government has attempted to improve the level of math skills in American School students. The National Defense Education Act (NDEA), The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and to some extent No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top all had improvement of math skills in their plans. For sure that some of the suggestions and innovative programs worked in some of the schools, but throughout the country there was no uniform quantum leap in students’ ability to deal with numbers.

In 1991, Professor E.D. Hirsch, Jr. (of Cultural Literacy fame), founded the Core Knowledge Foundation. Kirsch and his colleagues tried to quantify the bodies of knowledge in the school subject areas by grade level that every student should know. In his book, “What your 2^nd Grader need to Know” Hirsch devotes about 60 pages to math skills encompassing time, measurement, geometry  and money as well as addition, subtraction and multiplication.

The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (www.nctm.org) has long taken a leadership role in math skills improvement nationwide. Their vision is to “is to inspire, energize, motivate, and stimulate creativity.”

A number of school districts throughout the country have turned to the International Baccalaureate Program (IBP) because of its rigorous academic program in critical subjects- including math. The middle school math curriculum tackles the following  areas:

·  algebra

·  geometry and trigonometry

·  statistics and probability

·  discrete mathematics

For more information about the IBP you can access their website at www.ibp.org./

Clearly it’s time to bring in the heavy hitters, especially with younger students to show them that math can be fun and important.  So the Sesame Street characters, The Count, Elmo, Big Bird, and company have been recruited as math teachers for our youngest students. The program is called” Math is Everywhere (http://www.sesamestreet.org/cms_services/services?action=download&fileName=For%20Teachers:%20Math%20is%20Everywhere&uid=c9c23d0c-8cee-4958-a865-68ea5fb7224a) and provides tips galore to teachers and parents to make learning math fun right along with their Sesame Street pals.

It has been almost 55 years since Sputnik and while the US eventually did win the space race- if that’s what you call getting to the moon first -but it is still behind many of its European and Asian counterparts in math supremacy.

In Jun, 2010 the government released the Common Core State Mathematics Standards (CCSMS) which is to be phased into school across the United States in 2014. This will be closest thing that America school will to a national curriculum and should become a driving force in refocusing school mathematics textbooks. For a complete look at the standards, all 94 pages, access the following web site. http://corestandards.org/assets/CCSSI_Math%20Standards.pdf

As we continue to lose jobs overseas and we continue to find our high school graduates woefully unprepared to face  the workforce and adult life,  and as we continue to see the dropout rate increase- we must  come to the urgent realization that in many aspects ‘It’s all about the math.”

Oct. 14,2011

April is Math Awareness Month

Math- April is Math Awareness Month

The last time I taught a math class, the film “Donald Duck in Mathemagic Land” was still quite popular. Produced in 1959, this Oscar nominated 27 minute film was probably of the best education films to come out of the Disney organization. It was supposed to be the best way to get young students interested in mathematics. The federal government was in a quandary after falling behind to the Soviets in the space race. The National Defense Education Act was enacted in an effort to get America students to catch up in the areas of math and science.

Here we are fifty years later and America school students are still behind in mathematics.

Think about it. Math is a required subject in almost every grade level. Math is always a tested subject on state assessment programs and is a high school graduation requirement. Math is an integral part of both the SAT and ACT exams. Math problems can also be found in placement test for the military.

Computers provided a major paradigm shift in how students approach math problems and opened up new avenues for teachers to teach new math skills as well as to reinforce previously learned skills.

I would like to share with some web sites that might be useful as classroom aids and in getting your students to like math.

Aplusmath.com offers a variety of helpful tools. Student can make their own flashcards and print out worksheets for all major mathematic principles. There is also a Homework Helper tool and as assortment of mathematic puzzles. ( www.aplusmath.com)

Another useful site is mathgoodies.com. This site provides interactive math instruction. mathgoodies.blogspot.com