West Seattleite in the spotlight in high-school math fight

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You may have heard about the court ruling on Thursday ordering Seattle Public Schools to re-examine their use of a certain set of “reform math” books in local high schools (here’s the story from our partners at the Seattle Times). This morning, we’ve learned that retired math teacher Martha McLaren, one of the three people who took the case to court, is a West Seattle resident. She has a blog-format website with their reaction to the ruling – one of her co-plaintiffs is famous forecaster Cliff Mass – and previous updates, at seattlemathgroup.blogspot.com. The school district, which told the Times the ruling was “surprising,” is deciding whether to appeal.

Sage February 5, 2010 (8:14 am)

That headline made me think this was going to be a preview of a big math club battle! Nostalgia almost set in before I read on and caught thus was about curriculum rather than extra-curricular academics.

Aa February 5, 2010 (3:34 pm)

Most grateful that Martha was willing to take this on! I was told by the smug principal of my daughter’s elementary school (right here in WS) that the new math program was highly recommended by individuals with a far higher level of education than mine.
It has been most frustrating to be forced to provide a classic math education at home because my children were not gaining real skills at school.

fj February 5, 2010 (6:08 pm)

If the Washington State Board of Education found the Discovering Series “mathematically unsound”, why would they pick it? Seriously? We already have poor math education in the states.