America’s Math Crisis: Why Top Universities Are Being Forced to Lower the Bar

Greta Wire - Newsmax Podcasts

This episode of the Greta Wire podcast explores America's growing math crisis, focusing on how underprepared students—particularly those admitte

Key takeaways

• A significant number of college students admitted to top universities lack foundational math skills, despite having earned high grades in high school math courses.
• Grade inflation and the absence of rigorous standards in high school education contribute to a false sense of preparedness among incoming university students.

Main topics

• The decline of math education in U.S. public schools
• Grade inflation and its impact on college readiness

Notable quotes

"In the state of California, they know at Berkeley, the students who show up for calculus are five to eight years behind in math."

"It's like you don't have a driver's license in May and in August you have to enter Formula One race."

Conclusion

The episode underscores a national emergency in math education, warning that failing to address the foundational gaps in student

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:04) The Speaker 1 (0:05) city moves fast, but your vibe, that's different. Sharper, smoother, more alive. Speaker 2 (0:15) The new Speaker 1 (0:20) Honda City isn't just made to drive, it's made to feel. The new Honda City, all new vibe. Speaker 5 (0:29) When the world keeps shifting, we're there to help you act with confidence. At HSBC, we bring together the people, ideas, and capital that drive growth, backing your ambitions at every stage. So when you're preparing for the next generation, strengthening your portfolio, or you're entering new markets, we're there, bringing 160 years of experience to help you move forward. HSBC, opening up a world of opportunity. Speaker 4 (0:58) The Greta Wire podcast is presented by Paramount+. Speaker 3 (1:04) This isn't the end of a fight. It's the start of one. Lioness, the critically acclaimed original series from Taylor Sheridan, now streaming only on Paramount+. In the new season, hidden networks, foreign operatives, and personal betrayals collide while Joe walks the line between duty and family. Don't miss Lioness, starring Zoe Zaldana and Michael Kelly, with Morgan Freeman and Nicole Kidman, now streaming only on Paramount+. Speaker 7 (1:34) This should scare you. How about bridges? You want someone who knows how to build a bridge, right? How about planes? You want someone who knows how to build the plane you're on, right? Well, the people that build those things, build bridges, they all took calculus. So, this ought to send shivers up your spine. In the state of California, they know at Berkeley, the students who show up for calculus are five to eight years behind in math. And if you think this is only a California problem, you are dead wrong. What in the world is wrong with our education system that we are doing so poorly for our students because it's going to end up hurting all of us in the end. And by the way, where do we rank in the world in terms of math? It's embarrassing. It's just terribly embarrassing. We're not in the top 10. We're not in the top 20. We're not even in the top 30. Watch this podcast. Something has to change. Thank you very much for talking to me. Good morning or good afternoon, Greta. I'm on the West Coast and I'm very happy to see you. Well, I'm very happy to see you. And I read what you have written. And I must say, I was, I confess, I was terrible in math in high school, but I did know fractions by the time I even got to high school. You teach calculus. And I was surprised to see that you are seeing students come through the California state system. And I suspect this is true of other state systems who are not ready for calculus. Is that right? Yes. A Speaker 6 (3:27) lot of students in the past few years have come to UC Berkeley and other UC schools who are not ready for calculus. And the fractions, not knowing the fractions is just one problem. The real problem is that they have not been exposed to serious mathematics before coming to university. And by serious, I mean mathematics that makes them struggle, think, and overcome difficulties. And when they land... in our classes, we can certainly teach them fractions. We can teach them elementary linear equations. But the gap of thinking, of problem solving, is way too big to be resolved in just a few weeks of a summer course. Speaker 7 (4:23) Okay. That doesn't sound very good. And I guess the idea of the fractions, I think you learn fractions maybe in elementary school now. I mean, it's like, that's why I'm seizing on fractions. And I suppose that's why that was so electrifying to me. And it's so hard for me to believe that a college student who gets admitted to a, especially an institution like Berkeley, can't do fractions. So what has happened? Do you have any idea where this problem begins? The Speaker 6 (4:54) problem begins a long time ago when the U.S. landed on the moon. Yeah, that was good. Yeah. Since then, we as foreigners, I'm an immigrant to the United States, we see the education going down, not only in the United States, but especially in the United States. And while it is going down like this, slowly drifting down throughout the decades, since 2020 at the UC system, we have seen a sharp drop down. And I keep reminding all the journalists, and the public who talk to me and to our group that this is not the whole population of UC Berkeley or UC. We still have about a third of fantastically strong students. We are talking only about the bottom third. That third is Speaker 7 (5:52) our worry. I understand that, but the problem is that with all the great successes of the top one-third and the top two-thirds, is that it hides the fact that we're leaving behind one third at the bottom. And, you know, we read about all the great things that are done mathematically and in science technology with the successful people. But but we're leaving behind a huge chunk of people because we're failing them. You know, and and even if you if you push someone into an engineering program who doesn't have a mathematical background that he or she might need, person can be a flop. That is Speaker 6 (6:32) true. There is an alternative path for aspiring engineers and scientists who didn't have the appropriate background to enter flagship universities. They should go through, for example, community colleges for two years. And the top students from there actually can transfer to the top three UC schools after two years or to another UC school. So there is that. path where they can first strengthen their foundation as opposed to sort of dropped into our classes and asked to survive without having be given those tools or training over a course of many years. The way I see such a student in our classes is like you don't have a driver's license in May and in August you have to enter Formula One race. Well, how is that going to feel for the person driving the car? They're not going to feel safe, but that's exactly what Speaker 7 (7:39) our calculus classes feel to those students. Well, you know, there are a lot of, I mean, that makes an abundant amount of success. I mean, abundant amount of, that's a good idea. But the thing is, is that It seems to me, I mean, even people, you have people who they study art history in college, then they want to go to medical school. Well, they go back and learn the basics, basic science before they go to medical school. I mean, that means you have to learn the basics and to be put into calculus without having the background is a recipe for disaster. Speaker 6 (8:17) Actually, most of the students, to my knowledge, and you have to understand faculty has no impact on admission or enrollment. So we just take whoever comes to our classroom and we welcome them. But most of those students, is my understanding, have taken a pre-calculus, gotten an A in high school, or even taken calculus one and gotten an A. Speaker 6 (8:44) The grade inflation in high school is so severe that you might have such a student with an A in AP calculus class and with one on AP exam. UC system does not look at those AP scores on exams before admitting them. So it further, Speaker 7 (9:04) they use the picture of who is ready and who is Speaker 6 (9:08) not. Speaker 7 (9:09) So what do you do? Do you fail the students? I mean, I realize you try to help them, but you can't help everybody. And if they're trying to get into that Formula One car and they don't have a driver's license, what do you do with those students as a professor? Speaker 6 (9:23) So there are different things that every university is doing. I have not taught Calculus 1 since before COVID. I have taught Calculus 2 and we have quite a lot of freshmen incoming for Calculus 2 and seeing similar problems. So what the department at Berkeley has done for several years is it has created a summer online pre-calculus class. It has created the foundations of a mathematics class that students might try to take concurrently with the higher level class in a semester. Speaker 6 (10:06) Everything that we do is true that it will help only a certain portion of the students and even then they're going to struggle tremendously to pass hardcore STEM classes. Speaker 6 (10:22) The person, Professor Pauling, my colleague at Berkeley, who actually is heavily involved, he himself is heavily involved in creating those foundations of math courses. He was one of the reviewers of our open letter. He provided the data for our data analysis report. Explain what the open letter is, because I mean, I read it, but explain what that is. It is a letter written by five faculty members from UC Berkeley. It was reviewed by another five faculty members. And it came out of a department meeting of the math department at UC Berkeley back in May. It immediately had a very strong support among the math community. We expected only about 100 mathematicians to sign it, and then we can corroborate the report that came out of UC San Diego. That was our hopes. We did not expect that this would touch a national nerve and that everyone would start watching what is happening at UC. We definitely didn't expect that 3,000 of our colleagues would sign the letter. Speaker 7 (11:42) I'm not surprised because I went online and I looked at, you know, where the United States stands in math just generally and says for 15 year olds, we don't make the top 10. I