9 -- Moses -- "Algebra and Civil Rights"

Robert Moses equates math skills with civil rights and economic equality. I think that Moses is talking, in his own way, about the Culture of Power. The Culture of Power also has a component founded in Math and Science. Moses feels that African-Americans have been denied access to math, which shuts them out of the technological and digital economy. The idea also relates to James Paul Gee's article, "Teenagers in New Times." Moses sees African Americans being shut out of "enchanted worker" positions because they lack proper math knowledge. Minorities are not getting the technical, math and technology skills that they need to succeed.

In part, Moses cites one cause of this math deficiency is because our society values highly reading literacy, but does not value math literacy. I have to admit, I am guilty of this. I've always accepted that I "wasn't good at math." Few adults say they are "not good at reading." Either we are literate or we are not. Either we enjoy reading for pleasure, or we do not. So what people mean is that "I don't enjoy math." This is fine, but cannot be used as an excuse for math illiteracy. Another words, reading is regarded as a necessity, but math is regarded as a talent that you either have or do not.

Math always seems less political to me than social studies and English. History is always fodder for politicians, and often so for literature. Science recently has been very political, such as with the global warming debate. But math is usually accepted as politically neutral. So, it is interesting to the political elements of math raised in the Moses article.

Are there those who have been historically denied the subject I intend to teach? Yes. Yes. Surely yes. This is one of the biggest issues in teaching history. It is an unfortunate truth that history, as taught in public schools, is about dead white men. There is nothing wrong, per se, with dead white men -- I will be one some day, but they are not the only story worth telling. African Americans were slaves for much of American history and they were denied the ability to record their own words and tell their own history. The Chinese were viciously oppressed by the Exclusion Acts in the late nineteenth century, even as they helped settle the west, so their story has not entered the main stream history either. These are just two examples. Many other groups have no place the history taught in the typical public school classroom.

The stories of the "founding fathers" must not be erased, they are important, but they must sit beside, and on equal footing, with the stories of Indians, slaves, the working class, and others, because their stories are also important threads in the tapestry of American history.

We are trying to fix this. The whole of the social studies program at SUNY New Paltz is dedicated to changing this. A new crop of new teachers will enter service in a few years ready and wanting to expand the history books -- but the problem is the rigid social studies standards imposed by Albany that stand in the way.