I’d like to thank the Herald for focusing on mathematics education in a recent article and editorial, and also clear up some misconceptions.
There is a pervasive idea, especially among traditional college graduates, that community colleges act as “mini-universities” — places where high school graduates who don’t have the money or grades for the University of Washington instead get a technical education or do the first two years of a transfer-level bachelor’s degree. But that is only a fraction of our students.
Community college students are incredibly diverse. We have 19-year-old traditional students, 19-year old-high school dropouts, 60-year-old high school dropouts, hard-working folks who are learning new skills after having lost their jobs, refugees from war-torn countries, traditional-aged international students, ex-cons, and parents of all ages. Most have jobs and many work full time. Most community college students are poor. And the hardest working people I’ve ever known were community college students.
However, they often need more help, especially in math. The relationship between math achievement and income is very relevant. It’s true that most students who come to Everett Community College have to take pre-college math. Most students who go to the University of Washington don’t have that problem. The admissions requirements and price tag at UW act as a sorting mechanism. The students with the strongest academic background, typically a subset of those traditional college-age students, go to UW. The worker who hasn’t done algebra in 20 years comes to EvCC.
Health, access to transportation, a stable home life and academic achievement are all correlated with household income. I’ve had students who failed their class because their car broke down, and taking the bus took two hours each way. For someone with a full-time job or kids, problems seemingly unrelated to coursework can have a profound effect on academic success.
Quantitative skills are important to be a successful citizen. Ultimately, placement into pre-college math usually indicates that the student has larger challenges. Those challenges are complex and systemic. This most recent research looks at the effects of some of the work that my EvCC math colleagues and I have done. We, as well as many others around the state, have been working on helping underprepared students get the math they need.
Christopher Quarles
Mathematics Professor
Everett Community College
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