Contact: Jon Meerdink ([email protected])

ANN ARBOR — Math is a skill that can be learned — but not enough American students are hitting their early indicators for future success in mathematics.

For years, American students have lagged behind their international counterparts in math skills, and the learning loss from the COVID-19 pandemic has not yet reversed. Why? Pamela Davis-Kean, director of the Institute for Social Research’s Survey Research Center, explored several possible causes in her presentation titled “It Doesn’t Add Up: Why Mathematical Skills Matter across Development,” the latest edition of the Insights Speaker Series.

Davis-Kean explained that American students are not meeting key early indicators for success in math, but students who struggle in these areas often have no way to make up ground. While robust programs exist to help students who are behind in their reading skills — every U.S. state has some version of a program to get readers back on track — there are no comparable programs for math anywhere in the public school system.

This is a problem, Davis-Kean argues, because early math success is a fundamental indicator of how students will perform later in their academic careers. However, because U.S. math programs don’t help students make up ground, students often appear to be locked into a pathway as early as they time they’re about four and a half years old.

“I don’t think I should be able to look at where you’re at when you’re 54 months old and predict where you’re going to end up, but I can,” she said.

According to Davis-Kean’s research, earlier intervention on math-related issues could help reverse some of these trends, but improving students’ beliefs in their math skills may be an even simpler path forward. Research indicates that students with positive beliefs about their abilities in math outperform their peers.

Above all, Davis-Kean says teachers and policymakers should keep one truth in mind: everyone can do math.

“Just because you are not good at math does not mean you have a brain that cannot do math.” she said. “That belief has done a terrible disservice to students. Math is a skill and it can be learned.”

To view Davis-Kean’s full presentation, click here. For more on the Insights speaker series, click here or read about previous presentations below:

• ISR’s Kira Birditt explains why ‘concordant drinking’ may strengthen marital bonds in Insights talk
• Does an increasingly partisan political environment have negative consequences for democracy?
• Why anti-Black racism may be damaging to America’s overall health