{"id":23759,"date":"2015-07-02T15:40:30","date_gmt":"2015-07-02T19:40:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/?p=23759"},"modified":"2015-07-03T07:17:16","modified_gmt":"2015-07-03T11:17:16","slug":"algebra-isnt-enough-make-precalculus-a-bright-futures-requirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2015\/07\/02\/algebra-isnt-enough-make-precalculus-a-bright-futures-requirement\/","title":{"rendered":"Algebra Isn&#8217;t Enough: Make Precalculus A Bright Futures Requirement"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_19273\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 255px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Florida State University physics professor Paul Cottle.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2013\/06\/6-24-PaulCottle.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-19273\" alt=\"Florida State University physics professor Paul Cottle.\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2013\/06\/6-24-PaulCottle.jpg\" width=\"255\" height=\"200\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Florida State University<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Florida State University physics professor Paul Cottle.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>While Florida\u2019s Bright Futures scholarships no longer pay the entire tuition bill at the state\u2019s public universities as they once did, they are still a valuable source of financial support for thousands of students.<\/p>\n<p>Recent increases in the minimum scores on SAT and ACT college entrance exams required for Bright Futures eligibility have sparked some discussion and an investigation \u2013 now closed &#8211; by the Office of Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education.<\/p>\n<p>But aside from the test score requirements, the only high school courses required for Bright Futures eligibility are those required for high school graduation.\u00a0 In math, that means that only Algebra 1 and Geometry are presently required to earn a Bright Futures scholarship.<\/p>\n<p>The conventional wisdom among education policy-makers and scholars has been that Algebra 2 is the high school math course that makes a student \u201ccollege-ready,&#8221; and by that standard the math course requirement for Bright Futures falls short.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>But a recent study from the University of Michigan published in the July\/August issue of the Journal of Higher Education (read it below), suggests that even Algebra 2 does not adequately prepare students for a four-year college program \u2013 that higher level math courses are necessary to give a student a good chance of completing a bachelor\u2019s degree.<\/p>\n<p>The Michigan study actually focuses on Florida students because for decades our state has been the national leader in tracking student progress.<\/p>\n<p><div class=\"related-content alignleft\"><h4 class=\"related-header\">Related<\/h4><div class=\"links\"><h5>Posts<\/h5><ul><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2015\/04\/07\/opinion-florida-universities-should-invest-in-more-hands-on-science-lessons\/\">Opinion: Florida Universities Should Invest In More Hands-On Science Lessons<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2014\/11\/14\/opinion-for-better-teachers-larger-classes-and-higher-salaries\/\">Opinion: For Better Teachers, Larger Classes And Higher Salaries<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2014\/08\/06\/where-should-programming-fit-into-florida-school-requirements\/\">Where Should Programming Fit Into Florida School Requirements?<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2015\/06\/09\/are-high-school-exit-exams-an-unnecessary-barrier-to-graduation\/\">Are High School Exit Exams An Unnecessary Barrier To Graduation?<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2014\/07\/16\/study-more-high-school-math-and-science-requirements-more-dropouts\/\">Study: More High School Math And Science Requirements, More Dropouts<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"topics\"><h5>Topics<\/h5><p class=\"topic\"><img class=\"alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2011\/07\/collegestudentgeneric-60x60.jpg\" height=\"60\" width=\"60\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/topic\/bright-futures\/\">Are You Aware Of The Changes To Bright Futures Scholarships?<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/div>The goal of the study was to determine whether taking Algebra 2 significantly increases a student\u2019s probability of enrolling in college and \u2013 more importantly \u2013 completing college with a degree.\u00a0 The study&#8217;s authors worked hard to untangle factors like student demographics and a high school\u2019s academic culture from the actual academic effect of learning Algebra 2.<\/p>\n<p>The conclusion of the study was that completing Algebra 2 in high school makes it more likely that a student will enroll in college.\u00a0 But Algebra 2 does not significantly improve a student\u2019s chances of completing a bachelor\u2019s degree.<\/p>\n<p>Clearly, it makes no sense to set the Bright Futures high school math course bar as low as Algebra 1 and Geometry, as it is now.\u00a0 But if Bright Futures scholarships are intended to help more students earn bachelors\u2019 degrees, then even raising the bar to Algebra 2 is not enough.\u00a0 Instead, the minimum math course requirement for Bright Futures should be completing Precalculus, which is the course that comes after Algebra 2 in the standard high school math sequence.<\/p>\n<p>Coincidentally, the Board of Directors of the American Society for Engineering Education recently stated that Precalculus is the minimum high school math course necessary to prepare a student for a college major in engineering.\u00a0 In other words, a high school graduate who has completed Precalculus has the minimum math background to take on any college major.<\/p>\n<p>Bright Futures scholarships should reward students for being fully prepared to succeed in a bachelor\u2019s degree program.\u00a0 Raising the Bright Futures high school math course requirement to Precalculus would be an important step toward that goal.<\/p>\n<p><em>Paul Cottle is a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.physics.fsu.edu\/people\/personnel.asp?fn=Paul&amp;ln=Cottle\">physics professor at Florida State University<\/a> and writes about education issues at his blog,<a href=\"https:\/\/bridgetotomorrow.wordpress.com\/\"> Bridge to Tomorrow<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"embed-documentcloud\" style=\"text-align: center;\"><div class=\"DC-embed DC-embed-document DV-container\"> <div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:129.41176470588235%;height:0;overflow:hidden;max-width:100%;\"> <iframe src=\"\/\/www.documentcloud.org\/documents\/2157587-precalculusstudy.html?embed=true&amp;responsive=false&amp;sidebar=false\" title=\"PrecalculusStudy (Hosted by DocumentCloud)\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-forms\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:1px solid #aaa;border-bottom:0;box-sizing:border-box;\"><\/iframe> <\/div> <\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>While Florida\u2019s Bright Futures scholarships no longer pay the entire tuition bill at the state\u2019s public universities as they once did, they are still a valuable source of financial support for thousands of students. Recent increases in the minimum scores on SAT and ACT college entrance exams required for Bright Futures eligibility have sparked some [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[780,1014,1096,1062,1169,1082],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23759"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23759"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23759\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23764,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23759\/revisions\/23764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}