Discouraging Students from Taking Math

Coryoth writes "Following on from a previous story about UK schools encouraging students to drop mathematics, an article in The Age accuses Australian schools of much the same. The claim is that Australian schools are actively discouraging students from taking upper level math courses to boost their academic results on school league tables. How widespread is this phenomenon? Are schools taking similar measures in the US and Canada?"

It'll all work out

[SomeJoel]

After a few generations of not taking any math, administrators won't be able to figure out why not taking math increased their average scores in the first place. At that point, they'll re-institute a math program, probably cutting out history, since that's over and done with.

I dropped my math course

[Anonymous Coward]

It was sweet. I went from six classes to four.

Isn't this a good thing?

[glindsey]

Oh... wait... I thought it read "discouraging students from taking meth."

My mistake.

In soviet Russia...

[frieza79]

Math discourages you!

I agree with this progress.

[Anonymous Coward]

We should cut more of those boring science classes and replace them with something genuinely useful, such as football and liberal arts.

The obligatory...

[Kerrit]

I, for one, welcome our new woefully innumerate overlords.

True story:

[Anonymous Crowhead]

I worked in a lumber yard one summer when I was in college. I worked on the end of line that spit out two by fours cut from logs. The pallets were always of different height, but always the same width - 10 units. At the end, you had to paint the total on the side. So if it was 14 units high, you'd have 140 pieces. Me being "just a kid" wasn't trusted to paint the number. The "senior" person busted out a calculator every fucking time. To multiply a number under 20 (the max) by 10.

Re:I dropped my math course

[Anonymous Coward]

It's okay, no one understands us ACs, but I do. I sure do....

Re:Tinfoil

[Gilmoure]

Stick it to da' man: factor a polynomial!

Re:Bath?

[P00rSpy]

As long as they do not try to discourage them from taking Bath...

Re:True story:

[hajus]

Those kinds of people make me feel like rainman sometimes.

Re:How do you know?

[AccioBrain]

This reminds me of the quote:

"Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human. At best he is a tolerable subhuman who has learned to wear shoes, bathe and not make messes in the house." -Lazarus Long, "Time Enough for Love", Robert A. Heinlein

Thank you for your insightful comment!

Re:True story:

[Garabito]

I bet posting twice the same comment really makes you feel like rainman.

Re:Math?

[aqk]

Hey, lissen, assolle!

I have studied Mathematic! And Physic too.

You haven't. So shut ups.

Re:in college this would make some sense

[aqk]

>>>half-line r = pi/2 has ever made me a more rounded individual or better person.

Huh? trying to square the circle, are you? Rounded you say?
(sigh) Must be a sine of the times...
"Know thyself" - Socrates.

Adsvert too

[MarkByers]

Yes. In the same way 'ads' is short for 'adsvert' and 'abs' is short for 'absdominal muscle'.