Article #2
Christopher
Wernimont, Erin Clarke, Jennifer Hanzak, and Marium Toure’ are
Academic Lightweights Who have No Idea How to Generate Mathematics Curriculum
or Teach Mathematics
>>>>> Identification of Minneapolis Public
Schools Davis Center Staff Responsible for Abominable Student Proficiency Rates
in Mathematics
As the K-12 Revolution wrought by my book, understanding the Minneapolis Public Schools: Current Condition, Future Prospect, sweeps over the district, certain individuals are going to be squirming.
For decades students of the Minneapolis Public Schools have been academically abused with impunity.
No longer.
So be clear, among the highest paid staff at the Davis Center (MPS central offices, 1250 West Broadway), Superintendent Ed Graff and Interim Senior Academic Officer Aimee Fearing are the top decision-makers with regard to the academic program.
Responsible for implementing the program are Associate Superintendents Shawn Harris-Berry, LaShawn Ray, Ron Wagner, and Brian Zambreno.
Not a single one of these individuals is a scholar with any firm grasp of any academic field.
Among other Davis Center staff responsible for the academic program are the woefully trained staff members at the MPS Department of Teaching and Learning. Not a single staff member in this department of twenty-four people is a scholar with a master’s degree in a key subject area.
Thus, from the very top-paid staff at over $150,000 per annum (Graff receives $230,000) to those in the MPS Department of Teaching and Learning who knock down an average of $80,000 per year, there are no scholars or anyone who knows what she or he is doing in generating knowledge-intensive, skill-replete curriculum--- even if there was the inclination to do so.
As Malcolm X would say, staring straight into a camera as if he were going to break it,
“As you can see, we have a problem here.”
………………………………………………………………………………
Student mathematics proficiency at the Minneapolis Public Schools is an abomination.
The reason is rooted in the lack of mathematicians among decision-makers and a faulty approach to the instruction of mathematics derived from the exhortations of mathematics education professors (those academic lightweights who themselves struggle with calculus and differentials equations while waxing pseudo-philosophical in their approaches to instruction in the basic operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division), fractions, decimals, percentages, ratios, fundamental proportions, and simple probability.
The result is an enormously time-wasting approach utilized by math-phobic elementary school teachers and the spectacle of grade 5 students poised to make the middle school transition without knowing how to perform long division, lacking mastery of multiplication tables, lacking facility in preforming basic operations with fractions, decimals, and percentages; and having little idea as to the principles behind and the relationships among those latter skills comparing part to whole
Students then go on to middle school, at which they continue to rely too heavily on calculators as they learn fundamental pre-algebra, algebra, and geometry, so that they are at a loss to explain what they are doing in utilizing the Pythagorean Theorem, solving linear equations, and calculating and graphing slope. In the absence of fundamental skill mastery, they then wander through high school courses in algebra, geometry, pre-calculus (if they even take this latter course in functions, statistics, and trigonometry), and they muddle through--- for those few who take calculus--- the putatively highest course offered at the high school level.
Students thus wander through a murky forest of inept and faulty mathematical instruction, many still thinking in their heart of hearts that fractions constitute a higher mathematical skill--- true, too, of many teachers, especially those presiding at grades preK-5.
……………………………………………………………………………………………
This is all sinful: There is not actually that much mathematics to learn.
Properly rendered, instruction should make clear the very basic skills of addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, percentages, ratios, proportions, simple probability, graphing, and construction of tables and charts. Then students would be prepared to go forth properly prepared to comprehend algebra, geometry, pre-calculus, and calculus.
But Graff and Fearing have little training in mathematics.
None of the associate superintendents has advanced very far in the study of mathematics.
What graduate training those in the MPS Department of Teaching and Learning responsible for generating or implementing mathematics curriculum or overseeing pedagogy have is all under mathematics education professors, not under mathematicians--- between which there is an enormous distinction (no one holding a flimsy mathematics education doctorate would ever be accepted by colleagues in a college of university department of mathematics).
Peruse the qualifications of these MPS Department of Teaching and Learning staff members responsible for designing or implementing mathematics curriculum at the Minneapolis Public Schools:
>>>>>
Math
Christopher Wernimont
Degrees Conferred Institution at Which Degree Was Conferred
M.A., Mathematics Education University of Minnesota – Twin Cities
B.A., Economics Grinnell College
Licensures:
Mathematics
Erin Clarke, K-8 STEM DPF
B.A., Geology (College of William & Mary)
M.A., Geology (University of Wisconsin)
M.A. Education (Univeristy of Minnesota
Jennifer Hanzak, K-5 Math DPF
B. A. , Child Psychology (university of Minnesota)
M.A., Education (University of Minnesota)
Licensure:
Elementary Education
Marium Toure’, K-5 Math DPF
M.A., Education St. Mary’s University of Minnesota
B.S., Education University of Minnesota – Twin Cities
Licensures:
Elementary Education
Now consider student proficiency rates >>>>>
MPS Academic Proficiency Rates for 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019
(as indicated by Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment [MCA] results for spring of the given years)
Math 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
African 22% 23% 21% 18% 18% 18%
American
American 23% 19% 19% 17% 17% 18%
Indian
Hispanic 31% 32% 31% 29% 26% 25%
Asian 48% 50% 50% 47% 50% 47%
White 77% 78% 78% 77% 77% 75%
Free/ 26% 26% 25% 24% 22% 20%
Reduced
All 44% 44% 44% 42% 42% 42%
Thus, be clear:
Christopher Wernimont, Erin Clarke, Jennifer Hanzak, and Marium Toure’ are academic lightweights who have no idea how to generate mathematics curriculum or teach mathematics, their field of responsibility for which they are paid approximately $80,000.
Wonder no longer why student mathematic proficiency rates are so abominably low for the ill-served students of the Minneapolis Public Schools:
Those responsible are academic lightweights who have no chance of developing knowledge-intensive, skill-replete mathematics curriculum and have no grasp of how to render instruction.
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