Summary: Do you remember taking math in 9th, 10th and 11 grade? Did you flourish? Did you struggle? One College Professor in NY claims that kids struggle with Math so much that we should abolish it as a required class and make it an elective. It has ignited a firestorm of conversation, which could only mean that anyone with an interest in higher level math has a really loud voice, because statistics show that only 1% of graduates have a degree in math. Andrew Hacker (http://qcpages.qc.cuny.edu/political_science/hacker.html), Professor at Queens College City University New York (http://www.qc.cuny.edu/Pages/default.aspx), and the author of "Higher Education? How colleges are wasting our money and failing our kids and what we can do about it" wrote an op-ed piece for the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/29/opinion/sunday/is-algebra-necessary.html?pagewanted=all) and now everyone who wasn't talking about math is talking about math. He claims that of the 1.25 Billion kids on earth, 1 Billion of them won't graduate from High School and that their struggles in math are a major player in that decision. Nobody here or the Professor is saying that kids should not learn basic math skills, but we all are questioning the need for Pre-Cal and Calculus classes. A great replacement option would be Financial Literacy classes, but in this day and age with No Child left behind and National testing, there is no way that public schools are going to allow something like this. Are we all doing our kids a big disservice? I will only accept your answer if you can tell me what the (CoSin of A + Sin of B)/CoSin of G equals. Seriously, I want to know. I never could get that right.
