'WASHINGTON POST' ON CHS STUDENT'S MATH STRUGGLES

From today's Washington Post:

A push to enroll in AP calculus spurs a school to widen its program

 

By Jay Mathews Columnist

 

Last year, when I first told the story of Jordan Fields, she was a 15-year-old sophomore struggling to get her suburban high school in New Jersey to believe she could become an engineer.

Despite an A in algebra and excellent state math test scores, she had to fight to get into the ninth-grade geometry course that would keep her on track to take Advanced Placement calculus during her senior year. When she struggled in Algebra 2 during her sophomore year, the teacher, instead of helping her, told her parents that “she just doesn’t seem to get it” and suggested that she get off the AP track and choose a less-challenging career.

Jay Mathews is an education columnist and blogger for the Washington Post, his employer for 40 years. View Archive

[Why can’t a N.J. man’s daughter take AP calculus?]

 

The school’s AP record indicated that it was discouraging motivated students — particularly black ones, such as Jordan. That has long been a no-no in Washington-area schools.

James Hubert Blake High School in Montgomery County, for instance, is similar in size and demographics to Jordan’s school, Columbia High School in Maplewood, N.J., yet Blake produced 660 students in 2013 with passing scores in AP tests compared with only 524 at Columbia. Blacks are the largest ethnic group at both schools.

Most U.S. high schools are like Columbia, not Blake. They don’t seem to believe kids like Jordan can learn, even if they’re given extra help in thinking, writing and time management. Instead, such students are shunted off to easier stuff.

Read the rest HERE.