From: jmount+@CS.CMU.EDU (John Mount)
Newsgroups: sci.math,comp.edu
Subject: Re: Minimum standards for math "competency"
Keywords: math competency education university college standards
Date: 23 Nov 92 22:28:15 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.By6x35.M3p.2
Organization: Carnegie Mellon University

In article <drector.722539017@math.uci.edu>, drector@math.uci.edu (David Rector) writes:
|> jmount+@CS.CMU.EDU (John Mount) writes:
|> 
|> >In article <1992Nov23.140653.13522@scott.skidmore.edu>, pvonk@scott.skidmore.edu (Pierre VonKaenel) writes:
|> >|> Perhaps you haven't visited a technical university lately.  I recall
|> >|> professors complaining that most of their students are oriental, and
|> >|> where are the American kids?  I'm not sure about the statement above,
|> 
|> >I trying to imply you said the above (I even left a bit of your "I'm not
|> >sure about that").  But I think this kind of racist crud is intolerable- 
|> >a good number of the Asian students ARE American kids.

|> Your somewhat incoherent statement above makes even a staunch liberal
|> bemoan political correctness.  Mr. VonKaenel's remarks imply no racist
|> views; they may simply reflect a current defect in American English
|> terminology: how to refer to the once dominant Euro-American cultural
|> group.  You might try sticking to the subject.

Just because you refuse to read carefully- doesn't mean what I said
was inchorent.  Also, you are putting words in VonKaenel's mouth- he is
only reporting what he heard.  Read the quote- do the professors seem
at all pleased that their classes are full of Orientals?

It is racist to imply that Asians can not be Americans.  You are right
in that one of the most offensive aspects of PC is that they try to
redefine words on the fly- but I don't think "American" ever meant the
dominant Euro-American cultural group.  It has always meant "citizen"
and the term you are looking for is "WASP".

How do you think Asian Americans feel when somebody says to white kids
"why can't you American kids do as well as these Orientals?"  I'll bet
they don't feel proud that they are busting the grade curve, they
probably feel excluded and we are not talking nit picky little
language questions ("should I say Asian or Oriental?").  Many of them
are Americans and have the right to be lumped in with the local
idiots (if that is what they are into).

Real harm has been done by the "Asians are smart" myth.  An example:

At UC Berkeley there are a two really good minority tutoring programs:
PDP and MEP.  One is a tutoring program for minority high school
students (so they will be competent enough to get into UCB) the other
is a minority peer tutoring for engineers.  Both were based on Uri
Triesman's (sp?) work on how successful Asian students formed study
group.  Both groups work very hard, and do not do remedial tutoring.
Neither group (to my knowledge) has the ability to admit students.
This was great.  Triesman recently got a MacArthur award and you are
correct when you say the group he studied does (as a whole) perform
much better than average.

Now here comes the funny (unless you think all people are individuals
deserving a chance at success) part.  Around 1986 or 1987 Filipino
Americans were dropped off some "minority list" by the university
administration.  This meant they were no longer eligible for tutoring
from PDP or MEP.  The nasty part is the Filipino Americans even though
they look like all the other Asians have one of the worst retention
rates at UCB- so they really needed the help.

Read Amy Tan or Maxine Hong-Kingston about how much it sucks to be an
artisticly inclined Asian American when all your teachers think you
should be taking extra math classes.

|> Here in California the problem of poor math education is particularly
|> acute since California schools are a year or two behind the more
|> competent school systems in the nation.  One characteristic of
|> California's much esteemed Asian American subculture is high respect
|> for education.  Many parents, therefore, devote great personal effort
|> to overcoming the appalling defects in the educational system.  In my
|> experience they succeed no better than the rest of the population in
|> overcoming the deficiencies in content, and may even exacerbate the
|> tendency of our schools to teach for the short answer test.

I am of European ancestry and I went to UC Berkeley undergrad, so you
can consider my experiences as a data point- or you can ignore it so you
can safely draw any conclusion you want.

|> Incoming students to the University of California--all cultural groups--
|> share several characteristics:
|> 
|>     1.  They are bone ignorant.

Not all- I took night classes in 2nd year college DiffEqs while in
high school so I wouldn't make a fool of myself in college.  I *never*
took any course (public or private) on how to take the SAT or any
other test.

|>     2.  They perform very well on short answer tests where they are
|> 	asked to regurgitate facts.
|>
|>     3.  They will not reason.
|>
|>     4.  They are willing to work very hard, but they are not willing
|>         to be diverted by "theory" or the enjoyment of anything beyond
|>         the required course syllabus.

I was pure math- so there was nothing but the "theory".

|>     5.  They are totally at sea when asked to work independently.

I did a large senior project.

|>     6.  They are very bright and can perform well if (big if) you
|> 	can dynamite them out of their careerist fortress.

You think there is big money in theoretical CS?

|>     7.  They have no sense of humor--or wander--or beauty--or life.
|> 
|> We used to be able to beat some of the deficiencies out of the
|> students by the junior year (or at least get rid of some of the
|> students), but that is no longer possible.  Since students come to us
|> without the prerequisite information or attitudes, we have inevitably
|> lowered our own standards so that much of the junior year is spent
|> (re)teaching freshman mathematics.

In my senior year almost half my course work was graduate courses in
math and CS.

|> "Reforms" in education seem to have made things worse.  California's
|> minimum standards tests seem to have become maximum standards.  The
|> demise of the New Math, for all its faults, has meant that we can no
|> longer count on students having the basic vocabulary of mathematics.
|> Students have had no experience in numerical calculation, geometry, or
|> applying mathematics to a practical problem.  Many have had calculus
|> in highschool and not understood it--hardly surprising since they have
|> had none of the experiences, mathematical or practical, that motivate
|> it.  Most important, students are convinced that the point of
|> education is to collect isolated facts to parrot on a short answer
|> test so that they can get certification to apply for a high paying
|> job.  Many--perhaps most--do not even like the course they study.
|> 
|> Some needed changes:
|> 
|>     1.  Competent teaching is an exhausting enterprise--about like
|> acting--requiring enormous emotional energy and extensive
|> preparation.  No school teacher can perform well teaching more than
|> three hours per day--about half what is required in California
|> schools. University teaching is even harder.  Teachers must be
|> professionals and paid--more important, respected--accordingly.
|> 
|>     2.  Education is not the same as job training and is much more
|> important.  The great expansion of American industry in the nineteenth
|> century was based on well a educated (comparitively), flexible work
|> force.  Business (and the Republican party) supported--AND PAID FOR--
|> education then--why not now?
|> 
|>     3.  Knowledge is not devided up into neat little packages that
|> can conveniently be translated into departments, bureaucracies,
|> and grant programs.
|> 
|>     4.  The most important requirement for good education is having
|> fun--both students and teachers.  (One reason: a human brain does not
|> remember events unless signaled to do so by a certain control center.
|> Fun and fear are the most powerful ways to turn on that control center.
|> Fun motivates a person to repeat the experience, fear to avoid it.
|> The choice of motivation, therefore, ought to be obvious.)
|> 
|>     5.  Education is a social enterprise.  Teachers need to talk to their
|> colleagues and students; teachers need to talk to each other.  Class
|> discussion is very important to education.  It has almost completely
|> disappeared from the California schools I am familiar with.  Most of
|> my students would rather die than talk in class.

I have no desire to talk any further with you either...

|> --
|> David L. Rector				drector@math.uci.edu
|> Dept. of Math.				U. C. Irvine, Irvine CA 92717

-- 
--- It is kind of strange being in CS theory, given computers really do exist.
John Mount: jmount+@cs.cmu.edu               (412)268-6247
School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University, 
5000 Forbes Ave., Pittsburgh PA 15213-3891
Newsgroups: sci.math