The segment of the educational establishment that is promoting this very corrupted 'woke learning' is literally creating two classes of students; there will be the students who will suffer under 'woke education' and who will never be able to keep up with the second (and growing) class of students who will be attending 'unwoke' or traditional private & charter schools and/ or seeking other alternative ways of learning the tried-and-true methods of understanding math. It's goes without saying that Russia & China are laughing at us and loving this totally stupid period in our history. It is criminal. Bill and Melinda Gates should be shunned - they are living proof that too much money rots the heart & soul. But I'm guessing that what really is happening, is that very few math teachers today can really understand math or teach well....methinks this ludicrous turn of events is to mask their own inadequacies.
Unreal. The woke movement really excels at the soft bigotry of low expectations. Why engage in the hard work of coalition building required to actually fix schools and expand economic opportunity when you can either dupe or shame people into accepting shoddy education as anti-racism work? I've seen documents being pushed in my own workplace that describe everything from science, reason, time, math, and punctuality as white supremacy culture. It's runaway Lysenkoism.
I think the woke police hate math, science, and engineering precisely because it allows you to make an objective determination of what's right and what's wrong with no hard feelings (or fewer at least). And most often, all sides are proven a little of each. You put together a hypothesis, discuss and digest it a bit, and maybe even get in fights over it, but then you consult with the actual world to see how it goes. And the world will usually answer that question, so the people on different sides of the discussion can stop arguing and move on.
The woke police would rather the arguing continue for all eternity.
I’m just a mom, but isn’t the whole point of showing your work to ensure that one understands the process of problem solving and individual statements of fact? Otherwise kids (like my son) would just copy the answer from the answer key and learn nothing. How is that “anti-racist”? So let’s encourage most kids not to actually learn? Bravo. This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, propagated by a body of dunces who don’t under stand the real life necessity of mathematics in so many facets of modern life. As a mom, my children will be required to show their work FOREVER.
Ok, that's it, who knows how to start a school?! We need a sane, normal, un-woke, non-ideological institution where our children of all ages are taught with rigor and integrity. If math isn't safe, what is?! For real. I've been inspired by the indomitable Bari Weiss, and various recent interviewees on the Megyn Kelly podcast such as Ben Shapiro, who have stated over and over again that creating new spaces (in whatever sphere: media, education) may just be the only answer. Who's in?
I read the document from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and much of what it recommends appears unexceptional, frankly. The politics arises by the authors’ seizing what they see as the zeitgeist by mindlessly characterizing every listed defect in current pedagogical practice that they address as “white supremacy”. In a way, what is again at play is the deplorable tendency to takes negative characteristics and ascribe them to entire groups as emblematic. The main target against which society-wide angst used to be projected was the Jews Now, it is the faceless social construct of “white supremacy” in which, it goes without saying, Jews are still given a large role.
However, if you ignore the rhetorical framing and look at the substance of the proposals, it seems to me that they are searching for a way to teach math to students they would find more compelling, less daunting and more friendly. It’s not at all on the order of “2+2= Whatever you feel is right”. Much of what they actually recommend is unexceptional, and one can argue about the specifics.
Perhaps the authors chose to clothe their observations in the language of critical ethnic studies because they felt using the in vogue academic jargon was necessary to be heard. If so, they did themselves a disservice by jumping into the culture wars. But the substance of their report bears consideration.
To give one example, the discussion of grades mixes serious insight (teaching to the test rather than understanding the concept taught) with a questionable premise (what grades show) to make a rather simple point (once able to wield the concept, the correct answer will follow).
“Grades are traditionally indicative of what students can’t do rather than what they can do, reinforcing perfectionism. In addition, math teachers also focus grades on what is more easily measurable, rather than the knowledge that we want students to have, reinforcing quantity over quality and often evaluating procedural or skills-based knowledge rather than conceptual knowledge.”
Unless the pernicious ideology described so well in this piece is taken out back of the barn and shot, I give our country about 50 years or so--perhaps less. Thomas Sowell's quote (within) is so on target as to be frightening.
Our institutions are crumbling before our eyes. Who trusts our government, our press, the academy? They are all failing us. Protect yourself and your family as much as you can. Be shrewd. Be brave. Be honest.
I don’t know if I’m right, but I’m going to suggest a hypothesis, which is that the woke “educators” promulgating this hare-brained parody of math pedagogy know exactly what they’re doing. We’re incredulously pointing out how ridiculous it is, on the assumption that said educators are too stupid or ideological to realize that they’re consigning their students to lifelong innumeracy and unemployability. But I don’t think so. I think the point of this looking-glass approach to education is to deliberately create a generation of incompetent, self-entitled leeches who will milk victimhood for all it’s worth while demanding that other people do life’s heavy lifting for them. They will be the new nobility class. If they never learn to figure out the right answer to a problem that has only one right answer, what else will they be good for besides giving orders?
Thank you for a breath of fresh air. This American Cultural Revolution is just sad - and what's the favorite expression of ideological academics everywhere - derivative. Math pun intended. I would have thought our totalitarians would be a little more original with their suffocating attempts to control us all.
This is interesting that this arrived in my mailbox today because I started doing a great course on algebra review, so that I can overtime learn the math I didn’t take in school like trigonometry and calculus. I am 61 years old, a white woman, & I grew up in Texas at a time when advanced math wasn’t required. I have never been math phobic, Neither particularly talented but I’ve always been interested in it and no time like the present to learn something brand new. I also wanted to have some thing to concentrate on that didn’t have a lot of emotional crap with it. Or so I thought until I read this. Geez.
What bothers me so much is how infantilizing and condescending this kind of “woke “ attitude is, and that in itself is a kind of softer, more nuanced but no less destructive racism. It’s like if I were told as a girl that math would be too hard or was for boys only or that I didn’t have to show my work or get the right answer because of gender bias. AAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH!
{beats head against wall}
I am especially disturbed that this came out of the Gates foundation. I expected better. But like others, I have also been naïve in assuming that STEM could somewhat escape, particularly the areas of math and hard-core science.
It seems to me that eventually universities will start losing future endowments or other donations if they keep buckling under. Not to mention students.
As awful as this is, the fact that it's funded by The Gates Foundation makes it even worse.
So when Bill isn't trying to save the world from Climate Change or drive the world batshit crazy about Covid he's spending his money on racist initiatives that undermine the development of poor kids in underserved areas.
It's stuff like this that makes me think all is lost in America.
The numbers that are used in math came from India, a non-white region. Today's math would not be possible without these numbers. So math is hardly a mechanism for "white supremacy".
The Roman numbers (I, V, X, ... ) are not suitable for math, but they did in their current form come from Italy, usually considered a "white, Caucasian" country.
Hi Bari - new (paid!) subscriber here. Just wanted to drop you a note thanking you for embarking on this project. I hope it is wildly successful... and that you are too! Thanks also to Professor Klainerman for his sharp perspective. Looking forward to more in the series.
Wow. I cannot believe the woke movement has become so arrogant as to try and topple any subject that's grounded in the principles of human reason and rationality by labeling them racist. These principled have been cherished since the Age of Enlightenment. That historical period ultimately led to the separation of church and state. Perhaps we now need a legally binding separation of politics from education and the workplace.
I'm not a racist, and I refuse to say I am just to be popular. Keep up the good work Bari, it is a pleasure to pay to see real anti-racist content like this.
The segment of the educational establishment that is promoting this very corrupted 'woke learning' is literally creating two classes of students; there will be the students who will suffer under 'woke education' and who will never be able to keep up with the second (and growing) class of students who will be attending 'unwoke' or traditional private & charter schools and/ or seeking other alternative ways of learning the tried-and-true methods of understanding math. It's goes without saying that Russia & China are laughing at us and loving this totally stupid period in our history. It is criminal. Bill and Melinda Gates should be shunned - they are living proof that too much money rots the heart & soul. But I'm guessing that what really is happening, is that very few math teachers today can really understand math or teach well....methinks this ludicrous turn of events is to mask their own inadequacies.
Unreal. The woke movement really excels at the soft bigotry of low expectations. Why engage in the hard work of coalition building required to actually fix schools and expand economic opportunity when you can either dupe or shame people into accepting shoddy education as anti-racism work? I've seen documents being pushed in my own workplace that describe everything from science, reason, time, math, and punctuality as white supremacy culture. It's runaway Lysenkoism.
I think the woke police hate math, science, and engineering precisely because it allows you to make an objective determination of what's right and what's wrong with no hard feelings (or fewer at least). And most often, all sides are proven a little of each. You put together a hypothesis, discuss and digest it a bit, and maybe even get in fights over it, but then you consult with the actual world to see how it goes. And the world will usually answer that question, so the people on different sides of the discussion can stop arguing and move on.
The woke police would rather the arguing continue for all eternity.
I’m just a mom, but isn’t the whole point of showing your work to ensure that one understands the process of problem solving and individual statements of fact? Otherwise kids (like my son) would just copy the answer from the answer key and learn nothing. How is that “anti-racist”? So let’s encourage most kids not to actually learn? Bravo. This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, propagated by a body of dunces who don’t under stand the real life necessity of mathematics in so many facets of modern life. As a mom, my children will be required to show their work FOREVER.
Ok, that's it, who knows how to start a school?! We need a sane, normal, un-woke, non-ideological institution where our children of all ages are taught with rigor and integrity. If math isn't safe, what is?! For real. I've been inspired by the indomitable Bari Weiss, and various recent interviewees on the Megyn Kelly podcast such as Ben Shapiro, who have stated over and over again that creating new spaces (in whatever sphere: media, education) may just be the only answer. Who's in?
I read the document from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and much of what it recommends appears unexceptional, frankly. The politics arises by the authors’ seizing what they see as the zeitgeist by mindlessly characterizing every listed defect in current pedagogical practice that they address as “white supremacy”. In a way, what is again at play is the deplorable tendency to takes negative characteristics and ascribe them to entire groups as emblematic. The main target against which society-wide angst used to be projected was the Jews Now, it is the faceless social construct of “white supremacy” in which, it goes without saying, Jews are still given a large role.
However, if you ignore the rhetorical framing and look at the substance of the proposals, it seems to me that they are searching for a way to teach math to students they would find more compelling, less daunting and more friendly. It’s not at all on the order of “2+2= Whatever you feel is right”. Much of what they actually recommend is unexceptional, and one can argue about the specifics.
Perhaps the authors chose to clothe their observations in the language of critical ethnic studies because they felt using the in vogue academic jargon was necessary to be heard. If so, they did themselves a disservice by jumping into the culture wars. But the substance of their report bears consideration.
To give one example, the discussion of grades mixes serious insight (teaching to the test rather than understanding the concept taught) with a questionable premise (what grades show) to make a rather simple point (once able to wield the concept, the correct answer will follow).
“Grades are traditionally indicative of what students can’t do rather than what they can do, reinforcing perfectionism. In addition, math teachers also focus grades on what is more easily measurable, rather than the knowledge that we want students to have, reinforcing quantity over quality and often evaluating procedural or skills-based knowledge rather than conceptual knowledge.”
Unless the pernicious ideology described so well in this piece is taken out back of the barn and shot, I give our country about 50 years or so--perhaps less. Thomas Sowell's quote (within) is so on target as to be frightening.
Our institutions are crumbling before our eyes. Who trusts our government, our press, the academy? They are all failing us. Protect yourself and your family as much as you can. Be shrewd. Be brave. Be honest.
I don’t know if I’m right, but I’m going to suggest a hypothesis, which is that the woke “educators” promulgating this hare-brained parody of math pedagogy know exactly what they’re doing. We’re incredulously pointing out how ridiculous it is, on the assumption that said educators are too stupid or ideological to realize that they’re consigning their students to lifelong innumeracy and unemployability. But I don’t think so. I think the point of this looking-glass approach to education is to deliberately create a generation of incompetent, self-entitled leeches who will milk victimhood for all it’s worth while demanding that other people do life’s heavy lifting for them. They will be the new nobility class. If they never learn to figure out the right answer to a problem that has only one right answer, what else will they be good for besides giving orders?
Thank you for a breath of fresh air. This American Cultural Revolution is just sad - and what's the favorite expression of ideological academics everywhere - derivative. Math pun intended. I would have thought our totalitarians would be a little more original with their suffocating attempts to control us all.
This is interesting that this arrived in my mailbox today because I started doing a great course on algebra review, so that I can overtime learn the math I didn’t take in school like trigonometry and calculus. I am 61 years old, a white woman, & I grew up in Texas at a time when advanced math wasn’t required. I have never been math phobic, Neither particularly talented but I’ve always been interested in it and no time like the present to learn something brand new. I also wanted to have some thing to concentrate on that didn’t have a lot of emotional crap with it. Or so I thought until I read this. Geez.
What bothers me so much is how infantilizing and condescending this kind of “woke “ attitude is, and that in itself is a kind of softer, more nuanced but no less destructive racism. It’s like if I were told as a girl that math would be too hard or was for boys only or that I didn’t have to show my work or get the right answer because of gender bias. AAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH!
{beats head against wall}
I am especially disturbed that this came out of the Gates foundation. I expected better. But like others, I have also been naïve in assuming that STEM could somewhat escape, particularly the areas of math and hard-core science.
It seems to me that eventually universities will start losing future endowments or other donations if they keep buckling under. Not to mention students.
As awful as this is, the fact that it's funded by The Gates Foundation makes it even worse.
So when Bill isn't trying to save the world from Climate Change or drive the world batshit crazy about Covid he's spending his money on racist initiatives that undermine the development of poor kids in underserved areas.
It's stuff like this that makes me think all is lost in America.
The numbers that are used in math came from India, a non-white region. Today's math would not be possible without these numbers. So math is hardly a mechanism for "white supremacy".
The Roman numbers (I, V, X, ... ) are not suitable for math, but they did in their current form come from Italy, usually considered a "white, Caucasian" country.
Hi Bari - new (paid!) subscriber here. Just wanted to drop you a note thanking you for embarking on this project. I hope it is wildly successful... and that you are too! Thanks also to Professor Klainerman for his sharp perspective. Looking forward to more in the series.
Wow. I cannot believe the woke movement has become so arrogant as to try and topple any subject that's grounded in the principles of human reason and rationality by labeling them racist. These principled have been cherished since the Age of Enlightenment. That historical period ultimately led to the separation of church and state. Perhaps we now need a legally binding separation of politics from education and the workplace.
I'm not a racist, and I refuse to say I am just to be popular. Keep up the good work Bari, it is a pleasure to pay to see real anti-racist content like this.