Submitted by Haim, Jan 25, 2007 11:28

S E Anderson writes on Jan 24, 2007 17:06

"However, if we accept the latter, then there is something fundamentally wrong with the teaching of mathematics that consistently relegates the Black and Latino student to the lowest rungs of mathematical knowledge."

My thanks to Mr. Anderson for making his real agenda plain (Euro-centrism and hyper-abstractionism), but black and latino students are relegated to the lowest rungs of academic knowledge of every kind. Clearly, there is something going on that is very much larger than the mere teaching of mathematics alone, and Anderson's agenda is as clear an example as one could want of the fallacy of alternatives. Let me suggest an alternative to his alternatives.

The overwhelming majority of students, black and white, who are wholly dependent on the public schools for their education fail at mathematics, as they fail at every other discipline. The public schools are held hostage to a syndicate of teachers unions and schools of education, and only students who have the social or financial support to escape this choke hold can advance to some important degree. Sadly, black and latino students lack this kind of support more than most.

If Mr. Anderson wants to do something for the education of black and latino students, mathematical and otherwise, let him explore ways of constructing a latter day underground railroad that will lead them out of their educational bondage to the special interests of the Education Masters.

As for "hyper-abstractionism", taking abstraction out of math is like taking sugar out of hard candy: you will have nothing left.

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