AIR American Institutes for Research

NCTM National Council of Teachers of Mathematics

NSF National Science Foundation

PISA Programme for International Student Assessment
There seems to be controversy over which of the two international assessments -- TIMSS or PISA -- is better. TIMSS seems to be the study mathematicians favor. (That's my impression; don't take my word for it.)

TIMSS Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study
Go here to find results for the latest comparisons--plus a terrific little 10-question online test you can give your child (or yourself) to see how you measure up to the rest of the world's 4th & 8th graders.

sandbox (Catherine)

topics to add

autism and Asperger's Syndrome
Compare and Contrast
Connected Mathematics
Core Plus
Everyday Math
favorites
math horror stories
Math Thematics
Math Wars
newbies
learning & memory
off topic
Trailblazers

links to add

Arthur Hu
Tom Loveless
Diane Ravitch homepage

sidebar additions

real 'wiki' pages:
reader recommendations
reader horror stories/experiences
advice from readers

tasks

set up 'email this post' feature
set up private pages only Carolyn & Catherine can see
set up 'format for printing' ??

dedicated wiki pages

reader questions for interviews
reader book recommendations
reader horror stories/experiences dedicated page of wiki instructions that are instantly, obviously accessible

posts

http://www2.lab.brown.edu/investigations/author/q42.html TERC condescension to parents http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/04/06/AR2005040601587_pf.html 2 articles on Kumon

Dear All,

In the matter of preaching to the choir, C-Span has a video of Alan Greenspan's testimony to the House Joint Economic Committee. There is a fascinating exchange between Greenspan and Senator Reed about the divergence in income between skilled/supervisory workers and unskilled workers. They agree this is a very serious problem. At one point, Reed asks what short term policies can be implemented to "enhance the incomes of most of the workers of America.

I transcribed about two minutes of testimony which you can hear for yourselves, starting around minute 34:00 of the video clip.

Greenspan:

Well, Senator, I don't think there are short term policies, other than the ones we typically use to assuage those who fall into unemployment or policies in the tax area in which we endeavor to redistribute income.

The basic problem, as we have discussed previously, as best I can judge, goes back to the education system. We do not seem to be pushing through our schools our student body at a sufficiently quick rate to create a sufficient supply of skilled workers to meet the ever-rising demand for skilled workers which means that wage rates are accelerating. But the very people who have not been able to move up into the education categories where they become skilled overload the lesser skills market and cause wages to be moving up well below average.

The consequence, of course, is an increased concentration of income. And, as I have often said, this is not the type of thing which a capitalist democratic society can really accept without addressing. And as far as I am concerned, the cause is very largely education.

It is not the children because at the 4th grade they are above the world average. Whatever it is we do between the 4th grade and the 12th grade is obviously not as good as what our competitors abroad do because our children fall below, well below, the median in the world, which suggests that we have to do something to prevent that from happening and I suspect, were we able to do that, we will indeed move children through high school, into college, and beyond in adequate numbers. As indeed we did in the early post WW II period, such that we do not get the divergeance in income which is so pronounced in the data we currently looked at.

-- CatherineJohnson - 16 May 2005

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