Indeed, how we engage larger numbers of students in challenging mathematics courses is an area worthy of discussion for scholars like yourselves. And you can work with middle and high schools and other partners to help ensure that students get a rigorous college preparatory curriculum, particularly in mathematics, so they are prepared for college level work and careers with a future. This leads me back to the need to bring an end to the shortsighted, politicized, and harmful bickering over the teaching and learning of mathematics. As any good K-12 teacher will tell you, to get a student enthused about learning, you need a mix of information and styles of providing that information. You need to provide traditional basics, along with more challenging concepts, as well as the ability to problem solve, and to apply concepts in real world settings.
Different children learn in different ways and at different speeds.
A good teacher will do whatever he or she can to reach that child and inspire him or her to learn. Indeed, all Americans should be able to agree on much about mathematics. There are, of course, examples of questionable practices and teaching methods on both sides of this debate. Reform movements in mathematics education turn out neither as advocates hope nor as detractors fear. But these movements can energize those teachers who want, as Ed Begle once put it, to teach better mathematics and to teach mathematics better.