Tackling high school math’s equity problem

Credit: John Fensterwald/EdSource Today

High school math education has an equity problem. And it won’t be fixed without addressing two concurrent challenges:

• Too many potential STEM students, especially Latino and Black students, are being filtered out of opportunities because of tracking and placement practices.
• Too many students of all races are being blocked from pursuing other careers by irrelevant math hurdles.

As described here, it is simultaneously true that structural inequities cause Black and Latino students to miss out on the mathematics opportunities that would prepare them for careers in science, technology, engineering and math, and that a narrow focus on calculus readiness ill serves large numbers of students whose aspirations would be supported by courses other than calculus.

Addressing either problem alone risks exacerbating the other: A myopic focus on expanding access to STEM-preparatory courses positions precalculus and calculus as the only advanced courses available to high-school students, giving short shrift to other rigorous and meaningful preparatory options. Courses such as statistics, data science, math modeling and discrete math are excellent options for the majority of students who do not major in STEM fields. By providing hands-on experiences with areas of math that are more relevant to many students, they have the potential to attract students to STEM who may have ruled it out or been turned off by traditional math courses.

At the same time, solely emphasizing the expansion of math course options ignores the indefensible racial and gender underrepresentation in calculus and the need to build a more diverse and inclusive pipeline into STEM fields. That work must begin before high school, by strengthening early math learning for all students so all have STEM opportunities open to them.

It’s important that the state’s math framework, a new version of which will be considered by the California State Board of Education in July, supports these goals. But other strategies may be even more important to expanding access to advanced math, particularly for underrepresented students.

Because they convey strong signals about what students should study in high school, college admissions and counseling practices are also key to getting high school math education right. To understand how counselors can better support students in reaching their goals, my organization, Just Equations, has published a series of reports examining the role of math in college admission.

The third and latest report explores California students’ perspectives on their high school math course-taking in the context of their college plans. It highlights stark racial disparities not just in access to high school calculus, but also in access to information about the importance of math courses in college preparation and admission. Not only did Black and Latino students report being less likely to be counseled into high school calculus, but they were also less likely to be recommended to take any advanced math courses at all.

Changing this reality means ensuring that all schools offer advanced courses, including calculus. As of 2015-16, only 38% of high schools with high Black and Latino enrollment offered calculus. But it also requires changing placement practices to equalize access to advanced courses, which white and Asian students in California are far more likely to take than Black and brown students.

Whether a school system allows students to accelerate in middle school or during high school in order to take calculus by their senior year, such opportunities should not be skewed by demographics. That they currently are calls for a thorough overhaul not just of math preparation in early grades, but also of how students are counseled into middle and high school math courses. In California, that includes analyzing implementation of the Math Placement Act of 2015, which was intended to address such disparities by requiring the use of multiple objective measures in placement decisions.

But if the state is serious about math education, it should also raise the graduation requirement — currently only two years of math — and support districts in increasing the availability and variety of advanced math courses. Requiring three years would match the majority of states — and the requirements for the state’s public universities.

Colleges and universities also need to be more transparent about their admissions practices. Few colleges require calculus for admission, outside of engineering or other STEM departments. But a majority of admissions officers told us that they prefer to see applicants who have calculus on their transcripts, regardless of major.

Unstated expectations are neither fair nor equitable. While calculus preparation is needed for some majors, calculus as a blanket expectation creates needless pressure on students who are more interested in other fields — and those who lack access to the course. Not only are well-resourced students more likely to have calculus available to them, we found that they and the counselors who serve them are more likely to be aware of unwritten preferences for calculus.

The University of California is among the few selective universities that explicitly state that calculus is not a requirement for admission and recognize other courses to fulfill students’ third or fourth year of high school math. Yet, even in California, counselors we interviewed believe that calculus remains a “covert” requirement, even for students who are not seeking to attend engineering schools or enter STEM majors.

If the university is serious that “No single course, including calculus, determines an admissions decision,” and “students … should not view calculus as the only option,” it should provide data to back up the statement. Then perhaps high school educators would feel more comfortable offering a range of rigorous math courses and advising students to follow their interests.

UC campuses should also invest in programs that support potential STEM majors who enter without a calculus background — whether these are SummerBridge, Emerging Scholars, or corequisite courses — so that students’ middle school math placements and high school opportunities don’t restrict their ability to pursue a STEM field at a UC campus.

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Pamela Burdman is executive director of Just Equations, a nonprofit that promotes policies that prepare students with quantitative skills to succeed in college.

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