Making Sense of a Data-Filled World

Boaler, Jo; LaMar, Tanya; Williams, Cathy

I (JB) received a message recently that piqued my curiosity—Steve Levitt, a University of Chicago economist, famous for his book Freakonomics, wanted to talk with me. Because my contacts usually come from the world of mathematics and education, I wondered what it was that Steve wanted to discuss. What I did not know at the time was that phone call would be the start of one of the most exciting new initiatives I have encountered in my work in education, which has the potential to significantly change the mathematics we teach in classrooms. Steve became interested in changing the mathematics taught in schools from helping his own children with their mathematics homework. As a professional economist using mathematics in his own work, Steve immediately noticed the antiquated nature of the high school content and the gap between the mathematics his children were learning and the mathematics he was using in his own work. Steve and his center at the University of Chicago asked the visitors to their Freakonomics website—professionals from across the globe—what mathematics they

Read more...