The Growing Crisis in Mathematics Education in the Early Twentieth Century

Abstract

The place of mathematics in the American school curriculum was challenged during the early years of the twentieth century. Specifically questioned was the requirement that all high school students take mathematics. By the 1930s, mathematics educators were speaking of the situation as a crisis. The crisis had grown in the context of major social changes arising from intense urbanization, industrialization, and immigration around the turn of the century; America's involvement in World War I; and the Grear Depression. Along with significant growth in the school population had come a perceived decrease in the quality of that population. It was within this historical context that mathematics educators responded to suggested changes in the curriculum. Some of their responses may have exacerbated the crisis about which they were so concerned.

Health and pathology: a brief history of the biopolitics of US mathematics education

“…The Mathematics Teacher saw the perceived crisis of declining enrollment in high school mathematics courses (Stanic, 1986 ) as signaling a possible loss of “civilization” (Schaaf, 1930 , p. 496). Drawing from Spengler’s ( 1932 ) Decline of the West , Schaaf argued that threats to school mathematics were also threats to a “culture” (i.e., the West) and its “mathematic” (p. 496).…”

“… 1 We use the term “mental cultivation” instead of “mental discipline” because the latter, though also used, was understood in the sense of cultivating or developing a sound mind, body, and moral/heart/soul balance (cf. Stanic, 1986 ; see Baker, 2013 ). …”

Meritocracy, Color Blindness, and an Assumed-to-Be-Postracial Era: Challenges to Learning Mathematics in the Age of Neoliberalism

“…Mathematics has long been considered a gatekeeping subject (Martin et al, 2010;Stinson, 2004;Stone, 1998). This means that through tools such as institutional racism (Martin, 2008) and social stratification (Stanic, 1986), mathematics education has been structured to give access and privilege those already in powernamely white, heterosexual, wealthy males, leaving poor people of color in their already assumed social tier. While social class is not a focal marker of identity in this paper, race and social class are intertwined facilitating the way in which power and privilege are passed on "to the children of the wealthy and whites" while "students from less affluent families and certain students of color" continue to be disadvantageously left behind (Diamond et al, 2004, p. 75).…”

Problems in Teaching Mathematics in the Elementary Classroom

“…Recent committees on excellence in education are also demanding higher standard and more favorable results from teachers. A major response has been to place greater emphasis on school mathematics (Stanic, 1986).…”