More than 70% of Black female respondents in general math classes had “a negative math identity” compared to 14% of Black boys. And 86% of Black girls in general math did not see the connection between their desired careers and mastery of advanced mathematics — even when they wished to enter STEM fields. That is compared to 67% of Black boys. 

“What students believe about math — and their ability to learn math, to be good at math — is really important, both in the moment and in the long term,” said Ashli-Ann Douglas, a research associate at , a San-Francisco based national nonprofit. “And those beliefs are related to the quality of math instruction that they receive.” 

Douglas was the lead researcher on the report when she was a graduate student at Vanderbilt University. The 251 students in her study — 83% were in the 11th grade and 17% had been retained at some point and were in 10th grade — participated in fall 2019. One child had skipped a grade and was a high school senior. 

More than 80% of respondents were Black: 78% lived in a home with an annual household income of less than $50,000 while more than a quarter lived in a home with a household income of less than $20,000.

Pamela Seda, president of the , which works to empower Black children by boosting their access and success in mathematics, said there are two stereotypes at work here: that Black people are not gifted in mathematics and that girls in general struggle with the subject. 

“When you put those stereotypes together it compounds the negative effects,” she said.

Shelly M. Jones, a mathematics education professor at Central Connecticut State University and member of the National Council for Teachers of Mathematics board of directors, said math curriculum is often not culturally relevant. 

Jones, in teaching graduate students, highlights the work of trailblazer , an expert in ethnomathematics, the study of how math is used in different cultures. 

One of s papers examined the math behind African-American hairstyles. It was, Jones said, a transformative lesson: One of her Black female students told her �Ҿ��������’s work made her feel recognized in the topic for the first time.

“Black girls don’t see themselves in mathematics,” Jones said. “The things that they like, they don’t see in math.”

Douglas, the researcher, found that 99% of respondents considered basic math — number and operations skills — to be useful while only 58% said the same of higher level math, including algebra and statistics. The study, published earlier this month in the American Educational Research Journal, helps explain why the nation is missing out on the talents of many underserved students, she said.

“This is one of the ways we lose out on the genius of young people,” Douglas said. “Math is a gatekeeper in a lot of ways: When students do not have the math skills they need to access different careers, that is a barrier. And when they don’t have the beliefs about the utility of math, the value of math, they are less likely to persist and advocate for improved quality of instruction.”

Douglas’s paper also revealed that 29% of Black boys said their teachers’ recognition or acknowledgment of their performance in class was an indicator of their math proficiency. 

None of the Black girls said they received such positive feedback. 

Black students also did not believe their teachers were adequately prepared to teach the subject, regardless of their credentials, the study notes. And Black girls were more likely to cite their own poor understanding of math as a sign that they were not good at the subject. 

Students’ personal testimony was powerfully revealing, researchers said. 

“He doesn’t know how to teach in a way that people understand,” said one student in a focus group. “He doesn’t know how to teach right.” 

The result was devastating.

“I’m failing now,” the student said. “I never failed last year. I’m failing this year.”

Researchers noted that several students described that same teacher as “nice,” indicating the issue was not about personality, but effectiveness. 

Douglas said her findings emphasize the need for more inclusive and equitable math teaching methods to help marginalized students — particularly Black girls. 

Even with the required credentials to work in the field, teachers need ongoing coaching to help them work with students and relay the importance of the subject in their lives, she said. 

She and others from her research team spent a few hours leading a districtwide training shortly after the study was conducted, providing hands-on lessons for educators in the summer of 2021. In addition, 10 educators, including teachers and their advisors, subsequently completed a semester-long coaching program led by Douglas and her team. 

Douglas’s report is part of a larger longitudinal study of math knowledge development that started when the students were in preschool: The children were recruited in 2006 from 57 pre-kindergarten classes at 20 public schools and four Head Start sites and were followed through high school. 

Kelley L. Durkin, research assistant professor in the department of teaching and learning at Vanderbilt, and Bethany Rittle-Johnson, a professor of psychology and human development at the university, oversaw the last phase of the project, which wrapped up in 2022.

Rittle-Johnson said she was surprised when some students said their math teachers refused to help them or shamed them for not paying attention. 

“All the students in our focus groups valued their education, but they did not all receive the quality of math instruction and support that every student deserves,” she said. “Inequitable access to resources for both students and teachers have serious consequences for students’ learning opportunities, and it is not fair nor just.”

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Overdeck Foundation provide financial support to WestEd and ����Ӱ��.

Such a classification is racist, sexist, classist, inaccurate and — worst of all, they say — lasting. Many Americans who absorbed such messages in their youth continue to define themselves this way decades later. 

And they those insecurities to their children, as if math competency is an innate trait and not a learned skill. This sort of old-school thinking has, for generations, sidelined students of all types, including girls, and those who come from impoverished communities, math equity advocates say. Pushed away from STEM at an early age, they learn to count themselves out of lucrative opportunities. 

“The highest point that they can reach is drastically diminished if they are put on these lower tracks,” said Marian Dingle, a veteran teacher and head of , a group that aims to boost mathematics education for all students, with a focus on Hispanics. 

Math experts are calling for a new mindset, saying teachers and parents should expect that some children might need extra time — or tutoring — to master mathematical concepts and that these accommodations do not reflect negatively on their overall ability or potential. 

“Research shows that when students are labeled based on perceived math aptitude, it risks negatively impacting the student’s self-efficacy and motivation, leading to long-term struggles with math and kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy,” said Lasana Tunica-El, senior deputy director of campaigns for . “They’ve received and heard this labeling — and then they fulfill the labeling.”

Pamela Seda, president of the , which works to empower Black children by boosting their access and success in mathematics, said she would love to see a more progressive, flexible and inclusive mindset adopted in the nation’s classrooms. But, she said, American schools are quick to place students on one path or another, often influenced by the child’s race. Critical decisions are made early — and they stick.

“We use math as a means to sort kids by who gets to be at the top and who gets to be at the bottom,” she said. “Our systems have not changed.”

Seda, who spent 26 years teaching in public schools, isn’t sure why people’s notions around success in math have become so rigid. Children, she said, need individualized help. 

She recalled teaching her own kids — now adults — how to do their own laundry when they were young. Ranging in age from 5 to 9, she instructed each one on how to sort their clothes and operate the washing machine, she said. Her youngest needed a step stool to complete the task, but his mother was not deterred. 

“It never crossed my mind that he couldn’t do it,” Seda said of him. 

And that’s the same mentality educators must adopt when it comes to their students, she said. A math coordinator for three different school districts, she’s tried to create such learning environments and encouraged other teachers to do the same.

“The challenge is, they still work within schools and within systems that undermine that,” she said. “They are trying to do the best they can.” 

Math anxiety leads to another complexity, said Tunica-El. It impacts not only the general public but the . Many shy away from teaching mathematical concepts even in the early grades because they are unsure of their abilities. 

“And then some of that is superimposed onto students, unfortunately,” he said. 

Dingle, of TODOS: Math for All, noted that many math educators come into the field for different reasons: Some are fascinated with the subject matter while others are more interested in working with students. 

“So you’ve got all these different types of people thrown into the mix,” she said. “If we just start from a place of assets, I think it’s easier to lean into the normalization of the idea that learning is learning and it doesn’t matter the pace.”

Dingle said educators need to embrace the idea that certain skills are imperative to being human, including numeracy, mathematical skill and mathematical intuition. 

Josh Recio, systemic transformation lead at at UT Austin, said math is unusual in that the ultimate goal for many students is to take calculus in their senior year of high school — what might be considered as the ultimate signpost of whether they are ‘good at math.’ 

“But the only way to do that is to accelerate at some point because it takes five math classes to get to calculus — and there’s only four years of high school,” he said. 

Students who wish to reach this goal must take algebra in the eighth grade.

“So, you start seeing students placed into actual advanced courses starting in sixth grade, but that identification happens prior to that,” Recio said, sometimes as early as second or third grade. 

Some believe that the only way to eliminate tracking is to place all students on an accelerated path, but Recio disagrees. 

“I don’t think doing it for every student is right,” he said. “There are students who are ready to accelerate and there are those who are not. We need to continue to create opportunities to get them to that point.”

Alan Garfinkel, professor of integrative biology and physiology and medicine at UCLA, isn’t sure that’s a worthy objective. He questioned the value of added time and tutoring because the math we are teaching inside America’s classrooms, he argued, does not meet the moment.

“What does it mean to be good at math?” he asked. “The standard answer back then — and the standard answer right now — is that ‘good at math’ means the ability to rattle off formulas. It’s stupid pet tricks to solve absolutely trivial problems. That whole attitude is the enemy.”

More valuable, he said, would be for students to see — and solve — real-world problems by formulating them in mathematical terms and understanding how they evolved in a systematic way. He cited stopping the spread of COVID through modeling or finding out why people still turn away from electric vehicles, despite their benefits. 

“If you gave me a magic wand that I could use to make the entire population earn A’s in AP Calculus,” he said, “I wouldn’t take it.” 

Disclosure: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation provides financial support to The Charles A. Dana Center and ����Ӱ��.