Is It Racist?

The 2023 International Mathematics Olympiad has just concluded in Chiba, Japan.

This is the preeminent math competition for high school mathematics students from around the world.

Students from 112 countries competed.

China took first place.

The United States placed second.

Korea was third.

Source: https://newsroom.maa.org/252373-usa-earns-second-place-at-64th-international-mathematical-olympiad

These are the names of the USA team members.

Canada's team placed 5th.

This is Canada's team that participated at Chiba.

Source: https://cms.math.ca/competitions/imo/

I think it was a good idea to purchase a program if you wanted to follow the action in Chiba.

Interestingly, there is also a European Girls' Mathematical Olympiad that is also held annually and is open to all countries.

I don't know why there is the emphasis on gender as the International Math Olympiad is open to both males and females.

Why is there a need for a girls' competition?

However, China also won this competition.

The United States placed second.

Australia was third.

This is a picture of the first and second place USA and China teams.

However, as a joke, the Chinese girls are holding up the American flag and the USA girls are holding the China flag.

Can you tell?

This is the third place Australia team.

In the world we live in today someone could look at these results and possibly suggest there must be a racial bias in the tests in these competitions.

Several years ago the Seattle public schools declared that mathematics education is racist and "Western math" has been used as a tool to oppress people.

Source: https://www.hoover.org/research/seattle-schools-propose-teach-math-education-racist-will-california-be-far-behindseattle

 

According to Seattle educators, math instruction in the United States is an example of “Western Math,” which apparently is the appropriation of mathematical knowledge by Western cultures. While everyone agrees that two plus two is four, three times three is nine, and that there are three hundred and sixty degrees in a circle, Western Math critics worry about more nuanced issues, such as why we teach kids Western counting and not, for example, how the Aborigines count.

Students will be taught how “Western Math” is used as a tool of power and oppression, and that it disenfranchises people and communities of color. They will be taught that “Western Math” limits economic opportunities for people of color. They will be taught that mathematics knowledge has been withheld from people of color. 

I am trying to wrap my mind around the fact that if "Western Math" is a tool of power and oppression, and if math knowledge has been withheld from people of color, how is it that all the top high school math students in the world are people of color with roots in Far Eastern world countries?

All of this leads us to this story that earned headlines last week where New York City is going to pay almost $2 billion to prospective teachers who could not pass the school district's old teacher certification test.

Source: https://www.dailywire.com/news/nyc-to-pay-1-8-billion-over-old-racist-teaching-exam-but-blacks-performed-poorly-on-newer-exams-too

Settlement amounts for some individuals could approach $2 million.

These amounts also do not include possible pension payments that might also be owed. The settlement pays the failed teachers full pay from the time they could have been teaching. In some cases this goes back almost 30 years.

A federal judge had earlier ruled that the test was racist because 90% of Whites passed the test but only about 50% of Black and Hispanic teachers did.

However, even after the test was reformed, the disparate pass rates were still evident.

The new test, the Praxis exam, which is used by a number of other states, showed that African American applicants had passing rates 35% lower than White test takers.

New York City is already spending about $38,000 per student and yet the majority of students are not proficient in Reading and Math test scores.

What do you do these days when someone can't pass a test?

You get rid of the test.

“In 2017, New York State scrapped its requirement that teachers must pass a literacy test ‘because just 46 percent of Hispanic test takers and 41 percent of black test takers passed it on the first try, compared with 64 percent of white candidates,” the book said.

Teaching exams are notoriously easy, essentially measuring whether the teacher could pass the class she is teaching. Praxis’ creators said that “All of the content and skills in the three Praxis 1 tests … cover skills that do not exceed a high school level.”

In the meantime, while we spend time arguing about whether this or that is racist, Asians with two-parent families, a focus on education and a strong work ethic, ace all the tests and take home all the medals.