All About Mathnasium

[Anonymous]

I was the Center Director of a Mathnasium for about three months. Here's what you should know before signing your child up for the program:

1. The program won't hurt your kid. The worst thing that will happen is that your child won't grow in math and you'll have spent a lot of money. The best-case scenario is that your kid will love it, learn a few skills and strategies, and become more confident in their math abilities.

2. The percentage of enrolled students that benefit from the program is unclear. So far as I know, Mathnasium doesn't track the overall collective success of its enrolled students, or maybe doesn't care to track that information. For example, a center can't tell you 90% of actively attending students go up one full grade level within 7 months. While that kind of growth can happen in that timeframe on occasion, it's a relatively small percentage of students who achieve this.

3. The curriculum is decent for addressing and improving some skills (e.g. efficient calculation strategies), but if the employees of the center aren't paying careful attention to each student, a student could spend a significant amount of time practicing a skill they've already mastered. The initial assessment data is moderately useful in giving an overall picture of a child's math skills, but it's certainly not comprehensive, which sometimes leads to students being assigned skills that they already know how to do. If the student doesn't speak up as they go through this inefficient initial learning plan, they could find themselves not learning any new skills at Mathnasium for a month or two. This doesn't happen frequently, but it happens frequently enough to be considered a mild concern.

4. The curriculum is a little weaker in regards to teaching higher level skills since it's unrealistic to expect a student coming in once or twice a week to remember how to successfully execute these multi-layered skills (e.g. algebraically representing complex problems). Many of these higher level skills can usually only be effectively taught in school or at home with daily practice.

5. You won't always know how your child is doing. Mathnasium reassesses its students every 9 weeks, but Mathnasium employees are trained to not send the results of these reassessments if the data shows minimal or no growth. When I was a Center Director, I sent the parents the student data regardless of the results, but this goes against the wishes of the manager and owner, and only a principled Center Director will do this. If you do enroll your child and aren't receiving any data after 3 months, you may have to ask the Center Director explicitly for their child's test results as your child may not be growing their math skills at all.

6. Mathnasium primarily hires teenagers for the instructor role - the wages offered for this position are currently a dollar or two above minimum wage, so teenage labor is an important part of the Mathnasium business model. These teenagers are undoubtedly bright, but they, of course, have no teaching experience (for many, it's their first job), and they're given minimal training before being hurriedly put in front of students because of how much difficulty these centers have in finding viable employees. These young instructors are assigned 4 students at a time during peak hours, and if anyone calls in sick, that number can balloon to 5 or 6. To top it all off, these instructors often don't have enough time to meaningfully instruct their students since they're mostly busy checking worksheets that the assigned students at their table are turning in throughout the hour. ***It's important to note that I've also seen some really good instruction in my time there - I'm simply noting an important systemic issue with the model - that problem being that the bottom line trumps the students' needs.

7. The Center Director role is also typically held by someone young. I'm almost 40, and I was told that I was given a "bigger" salary offer than usual because of my experience. That bigger offer was 55k/year before bonuses, and roughly 60k-65k/year after bonuses (hence, the sales training a Center Director receives). There are no offered benefits. With this kind of yearly income and no benefits, you can't expect anyone living in an expensive city other than a 20-something with no significant financial responsibilities to hold the job. As a side note, the franchise owner that I worked for is currently attempting to not pay me one of my bonus payments from a month where I worked the full month, so if you're hired for this role, take notice of the fact that there's not a formal contract, putting you at risk of being taken advantage of by the owner. So yes, I do have a small axe to grind here, but that said...

8. This program can be really, really good for some kids - not only in terms of growing their math skills, but also in terms of the kids having fun. If you have the money (the program is pricey) and your kid needs math help or is looking for enrichment, it's definitely worth exploring. If the program will stretch you thin financially, please explore all your other options first (e.g. asking your child's school/teacher for suggestions, asking any families you know if they know any good teenagers looking to tutor, etc.) as this program certainly isn't universally effective.

9. This is a for-profit business. You won't hear any of the employees volunteer information to you suggesting that the program isn't effective or developmentally appropriate for your kid. If the program isn't right for your kid, you'll be the last to know unless you hear it directly from your kid. As a Center Director, I volunteered this information to the parents of my center, but I can guarantee you this is not what's practiced on a larger scale.

IN CONCLUSION, the Mathnasium program could be amazing for your kid, and if you have the money, it's potentially worth trying out. Just remember that this is a business-first operation.

Though the job wasn't a good fit for me, it might be right for you if you're a job-seeker - just be aware of the factors I listed.

[Anonymous]

Thank you- very helpful

[Anonymous]

One thing I think really helped my kid was “gameifying” math. We were just never gonna get that experience at home.

[Anonymous]

What do you think is the highest level of math (e.g. pre-Algebra, Algebra 1, etc) that it's useful for, in terms of learning concepts ahead of where they are in school?

[Anonymous]

It’s potentially useful for subjects until calculus, but only if the student is a capable and motivated independent learner. The curriculum’s scaffolding for the higher-level concepts isn’t bad, but without a capable and attentive instructor and a consistently motivated student, Mathnasium probably wouldn’t be your best bet once you hit algebra 2. That said, we only had a couple students at that point in their academic career anyway and my evaluation is only based on three months of experience, so I can’t say with full confidence where exactly that line of recommendation should stop.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One thing I think really helped my kid was “gameifying” math. We were just never gonna get that experience at home.

When one of my kid's were younger, I liked the app Splash Math for early ES, but they turned it into Splash Learn which is terrible. By 3rd grade they had moved on to BA which was better at high-level concepts.

[Anonymous]

It’s done wonders for my kid. But to be fair, we’re in a great center.

[Anonymous]

We went with the Russia School of Math. We like the focused instruction and the homework that is given. DS is in the highest group and is learning material not presented at school. It reinforces the fundamentals and then builds on those fundamentals. Kids do problems at the board and have time in class to ask questions and get individual help. And they offer free tutoring for kids that are struggling with a skill. Great program.

[Anonymous]

Thanks to OP for the honest assessment.