As NJ Lowers Math Standards, Fewer Students Can Handle College-Level Work

A year ago, a report from the University of California San Diego made major waves when it showed that a rising share of its incoming freshmen had math skills that were below the high school level.

Was this problem unique to that particular college? Or perhaps to California?

In partnership with The Collaborative for Student Success, I set out this summer to understand how these issues were playing out at Rutgers-New Brunswick, the flagship public university in New Jersey. Like UC San Diego, Rutgers is a well-regarded academic institution and a member in good standing of the Association of American Universities. While we were not able to gather the same level of information that the San Diego faculty senate had access to, we found similar problems.

Rutgers, like colleges in much of the country, is dealing with a bifurcation of student math skills. Some students are doing just fine, which at Rutgers manifests in a slight increase in the share of incoming freshmen who test into higher math classes like calculus II or III. Those students are well-prepared and likely to succeed.

But the bottom end is more troubling, as Rutgers also has an increasing number of freshmen taking lower-level classes like elementary or intermediate algebra and precalculus. Collectively, about 2,500 students were placed in courses below calculus last year.

Officially, New Jersey requires students to pass algebra, geometry and at least one more math class to earn a high school diploma. Yet even as state officials celebrate a record-high 91.8% graduation rate, 40% of this year’s graduates failed to pass the state’s high school math exam last year. Again, this is not unique to New Jersey; most states have large gaps between graduation and math proficiency rates.

In the report, I show how New Jersey has spent the last decade lowering K-12 standards, and how those decisions are affecting students and faculty at Rutgers. For example, New Jersey has created alternative ways for students to satisfy its graduation requirements, including substitute exams with passing scores below the benchmarks for college readiness on admissions tests. A student can satisfy New Jersey’s math graduation requirement with a 17 on the ACT, for example, even though ACT sets college readiness at a 22.

That can lead to a rude awakening for some students. Rutgers math professor Steve Safran told me that on the first day of his accelerated precalculus course, a majority of students said they had taken precalculus or calculus in high school. Many had earned As and Bs, and were dismayed at being asked to study the same material again. Another Rutgers instructor told me that some students arrive unable to add fractions without a calculator and become lost as soon as a problem introduces a variable.

Those gaps have consequences. Students may have to spend additional semesters working through prerequisites before reaching the courses required for their majors. Some switch majors or drop out. The grittier ones persist, but it takes them more time, and money, to earn their degree.

And the effects don’t stop there. One longtime instructor told me that if she gave today’s freshmen the exam she used in the past, a large number would fail. That puts faculty in the difficult position of helping students catch up while resisting pressure to lower their own standards.

Some of this disconnect could have been addressed much earlier if students had been held to higher standards throughout their time in K-12 schools. Math is a cumulative subject, and students who haven’t mastered their times tables are likely to struggle with fractions. If they are shaky on fractions and decimals, they’re likely to have a hard time with algebra. As I write in the report, early math performance isn’t destiny, but researchers have called it “a credible warning signal” that calls for immediate support rather than a wait-and-see approach.

Policymakers could also help by getting test results back to parents and educators quickly, rather than making them endure months-long waits. As one superintendent told NJ Spotlight News in response to the state’s testing delays, “It’s like we have an eye patch over one eye flying a plane — we don’t have full 20/20 vision or the full picture.”

New Jersey policymakers can start by giving families an honest accounting of where their children stand. States like Virginia and Ohio passed legislation to speed up their testing processes. While Ohio now requires districts to share results with parents by June 30 and Virginia says parents must wait no more than 45 days, New Jersey typically makes families wait until October.

But faster test results are useful only if the state is willing to act on what they show. The students arriving at Rutgers did not suddenly become bad at math when they stepped onto a college campus. Many had struggled for years. The failure was that too few adults gave them an honest evaluation of their math skills early enough and clearly enough for them to realize they were behind.

That’s the larger lesson from Rutgers and UC San Diego. By lowering standards, policymakers have boosted graduation rates. But if math gaps aren’t addressed early, catching up is harder and costlier, and students pay the price.