kitchen table math, the sequel: Core-Plus Students at Michigan State

Saturday, April 28, 2012

Core-Plus Students at Michigan State

In summary, our data show a clear decline in the level of Michigan State University mathematics courses taken by Core-Plus graduates. The existence of that decline is statistically significant at any reasonable level. The decline in course level is accompanied by a decline in average grades for all but the very top students, as well as a decline in the percentages of those who eventually passed a technical calculus course. These trends occur in data that include students from a variety of communities. The data from individual high schools show that the timing of these declines corresponds precisely to the implementation of the Core-Plus program.
A Study of Core-Plus Students Attending Michigan State UniversityRichard O. Hill and Thomas H. Parker Thomas Parker

3 comments:

SteveH said...

It's clear that curricula like Core-Plus have lost the high school math battle. The traditional AP math track has won. This influence has pushed down to our middle school to eliminate CMP and replace it with proper Glencoe Math textbooks. This change corresponded with the state change requiring all 7th grade (and higher) teachers to have certification (content knowledge) in the areas they teach.

I just don't see any mechanism to push better math into K-6. It's amazing to me that K-6 teaching pedagogy is so dominant. Fuzzy in 6th grade, but doing math problem sets in 7th using a traditional textbook.

Karen W said...

I'm not so sure that Core-Plus has lost the battle in Iowa. One of the co-authors of Core-Plus was a co-chair of the work team that wrote Iowa's math standards. Unsurprisingly, the math standards look an awful lot like the table of contents of the Core-Plus series. When the state board adopted the Common Core math standards, they voted to keep the Core-Plus topics as our additional material.

momof4 said...

Has Core Plus since been discontinued in Michigan? Replaced with traditional math?