The Algebra Project’s Strategy to Accelerate the Nation's Bottom Quartile Students’ Math Education and Get Them Ready for College Math

COFFEE_KLATCH · Invited

Abstract

Hermann Bondi in ``Relativity and Common Sense'' remarks that ``a wiser man is needed to ask the right question than to answer it'': One of the oldest problems is the question of motion. This has puzzeled people for many centuries. Why do things move as they do? What makes them move? (p. 2) Bondi identifies Newton's great insight into this question, ``his Principle of Relativity, as we might call it, is that velocity does not matter'': In other words, merely changing the question from ``What causes the velocity of the Earth?'' to ``What causes the acceleration of the Earth?'' immediately leads one from chasing a hare to seeing the Sun. (p. 6) The ``velocity'' of sharecroppers in the Mississippi Delta had been ``stuck in the mud'' constant since the ``work of death'' called the Civil War. The reason, to be sure, was their apathy, a ``chasing a hare'' explanation. The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, SNCC or ``Snick'', the ``Sun'' of the Mississippi Civil Rights Movement from 1960 to 1965, accelerated that velocity: Amzie Moore, the president of the Cleveland Mississippi chapter of the NAACP set the direction of the acceleration (voter registration not public accommodations); Snick set the tempo. The rest, as they say, is history. The ``velocity'' of students in the bottom quartile of the nation's public schools has also been ``stuck in the mud'' constant, with a parallel ``chasing a hare'' explanation: dysfunctional students, families and communities. The ``Sun'' of the movement to lift these students has yet to rise, but the Algebra Project (AP) and the Young People's Project (YPP) have been working for the past quarter of a century on a ``change of direction'' strategy: More math.

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Authors

  • Kawtar Hafidi

    Curry School of Education, University of Virginia, Department of Engineering and Science Education, and Department of Mathematical Sciences, Clemson University, Wayne State University, Rutgers University, University of New Mexico, ANL, JAEA, ORNL, McGill U., Northwestern U., U. of Manitoba, U. of Chicago, McGill, TUM, Maryland, LLNL, Yale, Chicago, Northwestern, Manitoba, University of Kentucky, Colorado School of Mines, University of Tennessee, Ohio University, Louisiana State University, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge Associated Universities, Los Alamos National Laboratory, University of Illinois, C.U., Southern Methodist University, Osaka City University, Department of Physics, Southern Methodist University, NIST, NASA GSFC, University of Maryland, Institute of Physics of the University of S\~ao Paulo, Polytechnic School of the University of S\~ao Paulo, Physics Department, University of Maryland, University of Washington, Universit\`a di Roma Tor Vergata, MIT, Columbia University, California State University Long Beach, Loyola University Chicago, Longwood University, American Institute of Physics/Society of Physics Students, Texas Christian University, University of Minnesota, Washington State University, Jet Propulsion Laboratory and LIGO, Caltech; Observatoire de la Cote d'Azur, The University of Texas at Brownsville, LIGO Caltech, University of Florida, University of Texas at Brownsville, University of Chicago, Fermilab, Ohio State University, University of Hawaii-Manoa, SLAC, University of Science and Technology of China, Indiana University, Michigan State University, University of Kansas, University of South Carolina, College of William and Mary, University of California, Berkeley, Universite Bordeaux, CNRS/IN2P3, Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Cornell University, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Bowdoin College, Brunswick, ME, Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics, HEPHY Vienna, CERN, Vanderbuilt University, Princeton University, Duke University, University of Wisconsin, Stockholm University, Santa Clara University, Stanford, University of California Berkeley, Department of Chemistry, Stony Brook University, Retired Chairman and CEO, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, State University of New York at Buffalo, Hope College, University of Wisconsin - River Falls, Sciprint.org, Inha University, APS President and Princeton University, Drexel University, Laboratory for Physical Sciences, University of Maryland, Joint Quantum Institute, Tokyo University of Science, UNAM, Rowan University, Duke U., Temple U./Jefferson Lab, U. of Virginia, U. of Saskatchewan, Insitute of Modern Physics, CAS, TUNL/Duke, University of Notre Dame, Yale University, Hofstra University, Texas A\&M University, Indiana Univeristy, Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Joint Institute for Nuclear Reserach, Georgia State University, North Carolina Central University, North Carolina State University, Gettysburg College, National Institute of Standards and Technology, The George Washington University, Indiana University/IUCF, Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, George Washington University, North Carolina State University/TUNL, IUCF/NIST, Georga State University, National Institute of Standards and Technology NIST, ORAU, TTU, Rutgers, CO School of Mines, UTK, University of Naples and INFN Naples, Italy, Second University of Naples and INFN Naples, Italy, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, 8800 Greenbelt Rd., Greenbelt, MD 20771, Rudolph Peierls Center for Theoretical Physics, Oxford University, UCSD, Boston University, JAEA, 1233 Watanuki, Takasaki, Gunma 370-1292, Japan, IMR, Tohoku University, 2-1-1 Katahira, Sendai 980-8577, Japan, ADMX Collaboration, ADMX collaboration, Argonne National Laboratory, The Algebra Project, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Acting Executive Officer of the Education and Human Resources Directorate, NSF, University of Michigan, Tulane Univ., Univ. of Wisconsin Madison, NIST; Indiana Univ., Univ. of North Carolina at Wilmington, UNC-Wilmington, Tulane U., University of Delaware, ITER Cadarache Joint Work Site, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, George E. Wahlen Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Asstrophysics, Bethel College, Kansas, Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL USA, Pr, Dr, Superconix Inc, University of Maryland, Universidad de la Republica, Montevideo. Uruguay, Univ. Paris Diderot, Univ. Pierre et Marie Curie, University of Jena, University of Wisconsin -- Milwaukee, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, U. of Connecticut, Jefferson Lab, Los Alamos National Lab, Departments of Chemisitry and Physics University of Rochester, Cyclotron Institute, Texas A\&M University, Texas A\&M University, College Station, Texas, IN2P3 Orsay, France, A. Soltan Institute for Nuclear Studies, Warsaw, Poland, Department of Physics, Florida State University, University of Manchester, Manchester, Bonn University, Commissioner for Human Resources, Science and Technology, African Union Headquarters, NASA GSFC, U.C. Berkeley, Stanford University, Caltech, Brandeis, BU, UPenn