Can the University of California be "excellent" while admitting students who struggle with math?

Graduation standards are weak. The state graduation exam is gone. SAT and ACT tests are optional. New Jersey's flagship university is adding low-level math classes.

Students around the world have trouble reading complex texts and evaluating data, says the OECD, which blames heavy AI and social media use.

Reading and math scores are falling across the globe as teenagers lose the ability to pay attention.

"Science of math" advocates are winning battles, but the "math wars" continue.

Helping students early -- before they fall off the academic cliff -- can be effective. The longer schools wait, the worse the outcomes.

California may require math tests and tutoring, starting in kindergarten, to ensure students learn fundamentals.

Failure rates are up for new students at New York's state universities and community colleges. Fewer students start with the basics -- or study skills.

Diego's A's got him into test-blind Berkeley, where he's likely to fail Calculus and give up on an engineering major.

Going "test-blind" was a "failed experiment" say University of California's humanities and social sciences professors, joining STEM faculty.

Younger students are returning to pre-Covid reading and math levels, but 13-year-olds are not, NAEP reports.

Refusing to measure college readiness ensures the reckoning will come later, at the student's expense.

Students who are passed along with wobbly math skills will pay the price in college.

STEM professors are seeing huge readiness gaps since the University of California went "test-free" in admissions.

Reading and math achievement was improving, until 2013. Then it started to slide, even more the pandemic.

Tracking middle-schoolers by math achievement doesn't hurt weaker students, but stronger students learn more.

Raising math achievement is difficult when educators don't agree on what works in the classroom.

More students are completing high school, but fewer are prepared to learn a skilled trade or pass a college math class.

Teaching math works better with chalk and chalkboards, say Stanford professors. It's slower.

Inquiry-first math teaching confuses students. Fluency comes first.