Harvard has created a new introductory math course for students who lack foundational algebra skills, report S. Mac Healey and Angelina J. Parker in the Crimson. Students will meet with instructors five days a week.
Remote learning during the pandemic left some students with math gaps, said Brendan A. Kelly, who runs the introductory math program.
My knee-jerk reaction: That's what you get for discriminating against Asian applicants.
Harvard just released demographic data for the Class of 2028, the first admitted after the U.S. Supreme Court's ban on racial preferences. Among students who identified their race or ethnicity, black enrollment fell from 18 percent for the Class of 2027 to 14 percent, Hispanic enrollment rose from 14 percent to 16 percent, whites went up from 29 to 32 percent and Asians remained at 37 percent.
Harvard had claimed that it couldn't achieve diversity without racial preferences, noted Edward J. Blum, co-founder of the anti-affirmative action group that sued Harvard in 2014, wrote in a statement to The Crimson. "It appears that was not true." However, he added, the results from Harvard and other very selective colleges are “mostly indecipherable without detailed racial data about standardized test scores, recruitment policies, advanced placement tests, legacy preferences, and other factors.”
SAT scores (including the subject tests) formerly assessed algebraic competence; the pandemic-induced suspension of that requirement, which was defensible for one year but not thereafter, has undoubtedly filled its buildings with unqualified youth who previously would not have been admitted as students, a problem with quality assurance typical of the reign of Claudine Gay (and Ketanji Brown Jackson).
It's far more important to know how to protest than it is to do math. Who needs math, anyway, right?