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Last Wednesday night, two teachers gave a presentation to our local board of ed about the summer school program. I'll spare you the details (unless you like hyperbole and don't mind if there's little data to support your rosy conclusions). One board member asked if the program should be expanded and how many kids could benefit (again, you have to assume that there is a benefit, because they never demonstrated one).
Here's the numbers, 85 kids attended summer school.
Teacher One: About 20% of elementary students could benefit from additional help over the summer.
The superintendent: There's roughly 800 kids in the elementary school.
Teacher Two: That means about 100 kids could use the program.
Teacher One shouts from the back: "96! 20% of the students would be 96!"
The superintendent smiling broadly: Did you use Everyday Math to figure that?
The Board Chair: I guess we need to triple the size of summer school.
I just sat there dumbfounded.
Yes, she used Everyday Math and got a wildly inaccurate number. 20% of 800 is 160, not 96.
which is just under doubling the current size of summer school.
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10 comments:
Thank you so much for this. What a great story. Cool superintendent!
The Super is leaving at the end of this year. EM was her baby. I hope she takes it with her.
Did I mention that "Teacher One" was my daughter's 3rd grade classroom teacher? That was the year math became an issue for us.
Oops. I thought the superintendent was being sarcastic!
No.
It was sincere.
She didn't realize the answer was wrong.
One of the board members is some kind of nuclear or chemical engineer.
I wonder if he was dumbfounded, not paying attention, or too embarrassed to point out their errors.
Oops. I thought the superintendent was being sarcastic!
Susan J, clearly you had a little memory lapse there.
Repeat after me:
"It's always worse than you think."
Things are hopping around here, that's for sure.
woo hoo!
Things are SO hopping that I'm going to enjoy losing each and every battle I undertake this school year.
LynnG--
I'm thinking this could be the subject of a great email to the board and to the superintendent. It could just be a quick comment about how surprised (appalled?) at the inability of the teachers and administration to estimate accurately.
While I'm sure there response would somehow be to excuse all involved as a simple mistake, made under the pressure and spotlight of an audience, I think what is more troubling is that all concerned were so quick to praise an incorrect answer.
Dare I say it--but was anybody involved using critical thinking skills?
This is the sort of incident that causes my blood to boil. I understand that people make mistakes (lord knows I make my share of them on an hourly basis at times). But what bothers me about this is that all concerned were so quick to praise the merits of a program, and nobody focused on the fact that the answer was wrong!
Good lord! I am appalled at my errors in the above Comment! For all my talk about proofreading, you would think I would have previewed my post prior to hitting the "publish" button.
Anyway, I meant to say that it could be a quick comment about how surprised you were.
Also, I meant to say, "While I'm sure their response . . ."
Even more appalling (and ironic) is that estimation is supposed to be a strength of Everyday Math! This is exactly the kind of "real life situation" that EM students are supposed to handle with aplomb.
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