Should Math Really Be A Required Subject?
School Time Biswarup Ganguly via Wikimedia Commons The novelist Nicholson Baker makes a case against algebra Nicholson Baker hates math. The novelist and nonfiction writer spends almost eight pages of this month's Harper's Magazine making the case that compulsory algebra courses in American education are at best, wrongheaded, and at worst, downright cruel. Baker isn't the first to suggest we turn the much-maligned subject into an academic elective, in order to put those who struggle endlessly with math out of unnecessary misery. Last summer, a New York Times op-ed by Andrew Hacker made much the same point: The myriad road blocks in our educational system that can only be surpassed by proving competent in algebra and upper level math--like high school exit exams and college applications, even for future arts majors--set up the non math-minded to fail, and often, to drop out of school altogether, he posits. Many...