Equity against Math acceleration

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:hyper accelerated math doesnt move the needle much, now amc, usamo and aime do.

Those two things go hand in hand. The kid who going to represent his university at the Putnam competition was most likely both accelerated in math and did well on the AIME, etc.

most hyper accelerated kids aren't actually doing math competitions

But you can't do very well in math competitions without being hyper accelerated. The kids qualifying for MOP usually qualify for USAJMO in middle school, which is 5+ years of acceleration before you even consider the many extra years' worth of competition-specific math prep.

Competition math is a backwater.

[Anonymous]

Should be a given, but acceleration in math or any subject isn’t just about admissions but also about going deeper in a field once in college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is an equity minion troll on this forum that downplays the benefits of math acceleration. Usually the poster did algebra1 in 6th, Calc BC in 9th, and Discrete math in 12th, but still not get admitted into Ivys, T10, Princeton, MIT, etc. The troll then replies as another poster saying Princeton admitted their child with just Calc AB in 12th, concluding math acceleration did not help at all, everyone should stick to grade level math.

How many here actually have their students accelerate in math on an average and what is the math they graduate HS with? Does it help college admissions especially for STEM majors.

I am no equity minion and believe that kid should take the highest math they are capable of. That said, I can tell you that my kid finished HS with Calc BC in 10th and multiple semester of college math all As, high scores etc, and was WL and rejected at all T10 / Ivy. Was coming from a magnet school and doing CS but goes to show that there are many factors in this.

CS/eng major for college admissions is brutal, especially for white/asian males from this area. Doesn't matter if they take the highest level math class or get a perfect SAT score. It's just brutal.

It does matter though, looking from inside ivies/T10 within Engineering : the kids all took the highest math available at their HS. For many kids that is Multivariable or Linear or both after BC Calc in 11th. The ones that do not have that took whatever their HS highest was, usually BC or AB or IB calculus. Not any of them took less than the highest track offered.
In other words, the highest path offered at the HS matters to AOs and is necessary, but it is not sufficient: in many HSs especially prep schools and magnet publics, 1/4-1/3 have post-BC -math on their resumes. And yet most of these schools do not have the entire top-path 1/4-1/3 getting into T10s. Who gets in is determined by the rest of the resume, on top of and in addition to being in the high schools highest math.

For non-stem/non-Engineering school within an ivy, highest math still may matter since all students are allowed to choose any major, but not as much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Multiple kids in my 12th graders' FCPS AB Calc class going to Ivys. And I mean about five kids going to top Ivys. So I kind of think the math acceleration thing is BS. (My own DC going to a perfectly fine college, we were not playing the Ivys game). Just noting that after going through college admissions with my 12th grader, you can really see it is a crap shoot. Just take plenty of APs and get great grades and great SATs. But you do not have to be in a super accelerated math class, that is now clear.

Thank you for sharing this. We don't have kids in college yet but math track is something we are constantly talking about. Husband was one of those kids who took Calc as a 9th grader and is pretty strongly against accelerating the kids. He grinded throughout HS and went to HYP and is now a lawyer. He doesn't see the point of spending his early years doing so much math when his true interests were elsewhere. I took Calc BC as a senior, went off to college and got my butt kicked in MV. Wow, I realised how I truly BS'd my way into getting a 5 on the BC AP exam.


Our kids are good at math but we see stronger natural interest in the humanities, history. Our oldest is on track to finish with AP Calc AB so we'll see where he lands. Our others have the opportunity to accelerate to take Calc in 10th but we decided to keep them on the "regular" "accelerated track"... Calc in 11th.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Race to nowhere.

True, it isn’t a race, and there is is no set destination. It’s not about the specific math course, but that kids are getting challenged and made to think and work hard. I don’t care if my child ever uses or needs calculus or beyond. That isn’t the point. The goal for us as parents, who have kids in highly accelerated math, is for them expand their brain and do difficult work. This in turns preps them for advanced learning and skills in many areas, academic and other

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Multi variable in 12th. CMU CS admitted.

Calculus in 10th, 3 courses post-BC calc math completed(offered at HS). Admitted to multiple t10s, picked a top ivy. 1/3 of the freshman class not just stem had multivariable or more in their HS. DC’s engineering friends seem to be 2/3 had MVC or more. Very few had diffEQ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Multi variable in 12th. CMU CS admitted.

Calculus in 10th, 3 courses post-BC calc math completed(offered at HS). Admitted to multiple t10s, picked a top ivy. 1/3 of the freshman class not just stem had multivariable or more in their HS. DC’s engineering friends seem to be 2/3 had MVC or more. Very few had diffEQ.

Thanks for sharing. Congrats to a smart, driven child!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is an equity minion troll on this forum that downplays the benefits of math acceleration. Usually the poster did algebra1 in 6th, Calc BC in 9th, and Discrete math in 12th, but still not get admitted into Ivys, T10, Princeton, MIT, etc. The troll then replies as another poster saying Princeton admitted their child with just Calc AB in 12th, concluding math acceleration did not help at all, everyone should stick to grade level math.

How many here actually have their students accelerate in math on an average and what is the math they graduate HS with? Does it help college admissions especially for STEM majors.

I am no equity minion and believe that kid should take the highest math they are capable of. That said, I can tell you that my kid finished HS with Calc BC in 10th and multiple semester of college math all As, high scores etc, and was WL and rejected at all T10 / Ivy. Was coming from a magnet school and doing CS but goes to show that there are many factors in this.

CS/eng major for college admissions is brutal, especially for white/asian males from this area. Doesn't matter if they take the highest level math class or get a perfect SAT score. It's just brutal.

It does matter though, looking from inside ivies/T10 within Engineering : the kids all took the highest math available at their HS. For many kids that is Multivariable or Linear or both after BC Calc in 11th. The ones that do not have that took whatever their HS highest was, usually BC or AB or IB calculus. Not any of them took less than the highest track offered.
In other words, the highest path offered at the HS matters to AOs and is necessary, but it is not sufficient: in many HSs especially prep schools and magnet publics, 1/4-1/3 have post-BC -math on their resumes. And yet most of these schools do not have the entire top-path 1/4-1/3 getting into T10s. Who gets in is determined by the rest of the resume, on top of and in addition to being in the high schools highest math.

For non-stem/non-Engineering school within an ivy, highest math still may matter since all students are allowed to choose any major, but not as much.

This is gunner nonsense. Elite AOs don't care about your community college math classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:hyper accelerated math doesnt move the needle much, now amc, usamo and aime do.

Those two things go hand in hand. The kid who going to represent his university at the Putnam competition was most likely both accelerated in math and did well on the AIME, etc.

most hyper accelerated kids aren't actually doing math competitions

But you can't do very well in math competitions without being hyper accelerated. The kids qualifying for MOP usually qualify for USAJMO in middle school, which is 5+ years of acceleration before you even consider the many extra years' worth of competition-specific math prep.

Competition math is a backwater.

All ECs are backwaters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:2 kids at Ivies. One completed MVC and one BC Calc. MVC kid said that math in college is hard and kids were crying during the math final 2 weeks ago. As a poster before stated- it is important to understand math, so not sure what the obsession with acceleration is.

Going slower on the earlier stuff may be helpful, but doesn't mean that the other classes will be easier. They aren't all directly connected.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Race to nowhere.

True, it isn’t a race, and there is is no set destination. It’s not about the specific math course, but that kids are getting challenged and made to think and work hard. I don’t care if my child ever uses or needs calculus or beyond. That isn’t the point. The goal for us as parents, who have kids in highly accelerated math, is for them expand their brain and do difficult work. This in turns preps them for advanced learning and skills in many areas, academic and other

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Race to nowhere.

The counterpoint is that especially in lower grades math moves very slowly and a large fraction of the kids could would benefit from a faster pace.

Sure, some advanced topics/acceleration make sense. But we reach diminishing returns at some point. Only exception being the rare math genius who jumps ahead grades.

Also as younger and younger kids take these classes the curriculum is altered. Look at algebra text from a couple generations ago they are very difficult.

I haven't seen this difference. Main difference is the calculator stuff and stats content wasn't mixed in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is an equity minion troll on this forum that downplays the benefits of math acceleration. Usually the poster did algebra1 in 6th, Calc BC in 9th, and Discrete math in 12th, but still not get admitted into Ivys, T10, Princeton, MIT, etc. The troll then replies as another poster saying Princeton admitted their child with just Calc AB in 12th, concluding math acceleration did not help at all, everyone should stick to grade level math.

How many here actually have their students accelerate in math on an average and what is the math they graduate HS with? Does it help college admissions especially for STEM majors.

I am no equity minion and believe that kid should take the highest math they are capable of. That said, I can tell you that my kid finished HS with Calc BC in 10th and multiple semester of college math all As, high scores etc, and was WL and rejected at all T10 / Ivy. Was coming from a magnet school and doing CS but goes to show that there are many factors in this.

CS/eng major for college admissions is brutal, especially for white/asian males from this area. Doesn't matter if they take the highest level math class or get a perfect SAT score. It's just brutal.

It’s only brutal if you’re obsessed with T20. What’s wrong with Florida State or U Iowa? Serious question by the way.

There is no Math 20700 (UChicago) or Math 55 (Harvard) at Florida State or U Iowa. Georgia State has 3500H, but that's still at least two notches below.

UF has 5228, which is advanced version of 4226, both of which have a prereq of basic real analysis.

https://math.ufl.edu/first-year-exam-syllabi/maa-5228-modern-analysis-1/
So what? Math 55 was replaced by

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:hyper accelerated math doesnt move the needle much, now amc, usamo and aime do.

Those two things go hand in hand. The kid who going to represent his university at the Putnam competition was most likely both accelerated in math and did well on the AIME, etc.

It's a mix. Except for a few extreme math academies (California, Nevada, and a few others) and home schoolers who don't have class levels at all, the other math contest people just do whatever in school and learn advanced/enriched math after school (or on their laptops in school while ignoring class).

There are plenty of schools that don't deliberately hinder their students' educations by allowing them to work at their own pace, either with AoPS, EMF, or similar. That's how TJ has kids taking BC in 9th.

FCPS has middle schools where students do AoPS or EMF instead of the FCPS class?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So, is “equity minion” an actual phrase people are using, or just a made-up silly phrase that at least one poster keeps using in various threads?

Still wondering about this. Does the person who ses this phrase think that they are somehow clever or funny?