the trouble with math

One problem with teaching mathematics in the K-12 system - and I see it as a major difficulty - is that there is virtually nothing the pupils learn that has a non-trivial application in today's world. The most a teacher can tell a student who enquires, entirely reasonably, "How is this useful?" is that almost all mathematics finds uses, in many cases important ones, and that what they learn in school leads on to mathematics that definitely is used.

Things change dramatically around the sophomore university level, when almost everything a student learns has significant applications.

I am not arguing that utility is the only or even the primary reason for teaching math. But the question of utility is a valid one that deserves an answer, and there really isn't a good one. For many school pupils, and often their parents, the lack of a good answer is enough to persuade them to give up on math and focus their efforts elsewhere.

mathematician in residence programs for 8-12

Another possibility to try to motivate K-12 students (actually, in my experience from visiting schools and talking with their teachers, it is the older pupils who are the ones more likely to require motivation, say grades 8 or 9 upward) is for professional mathematicians to visit schools. I know I am not the only mathematician who does this. There is nothing like presenting pupils with a living, breathing, professional mathematician who can provide a first-hand example of what mathematicians do in and for society.

I recently spent two weeks in Australia, as the Mathematician in Residence at St. Peters College in Adelaide. This was only the second time in my life that a high school had invited me to spend some time as a visitor, and the first time overseas - over a very large sea in fact! In both cases, the high school in question was private, and had secured private endowment funding to support such an activity. For two weeks, I spent each day in the school, giving classes. Many classes were one-offs, and I spent the time answering that "What do mathematicians do?" question. For some 11 and 12 grade classes, we met several times and I gave presentations and mini-lessons, answered questions, engaged in problem sessions, and generally got to know the students, and they me. You would have to ask the students what they got from my visit, but from my perspective (and that of the former head of mathematics at the school, David Martin, who organized my visit), they gained a lot. To appreciate a human activity such as mathematics, there is, after all, nothing that can match having a real-life practitioner on call for a couple of weeks.

Thought of on its own, such a program seems expensive. But viewed as a component of the entire mathematics education program at a school, the incremental cost of a "mathematician in residence" is small, though in the anti-educational and anti-science wasteland that is George Bush's America it may be a hard sell in the U.S. just now. But definitely worth a try when the educational climate improves, I think. If it fails, the funds can always be diverted elsewhere.

Devlin's Angle
Keith Devlin
MAA Online
June 2007

I would like to see college professors brought into public schools to give talks - and to do residencies.

I've been introducing the idea around here; I know some parents are interested.