STEM: Is the "New Math" Here Again?

“The public now demands better education.  It doesn't know what good education is, and it fears every particular manifestation of it, but it is so far committed that it will accept, if only for a while, a certain number of genuine reforms.  When enough of these reforms have been adopted, the public will feel free to call it a day.  The job, they will say, is done.”

Math Professor, Ralph A. Raimi on New Math, June 29, 1958

According to Wikipedia, the New Math movement was a “dramatic change” in the way that mathematics was taught in the 1960’s…and it was “introduced in the U.S. shortly after the Sputnik crisis in order to boost science education and mathematical skill in the population so that the intellectual threat of Soviet engineers, reputedly highly skilled mathematicians, could be met.” In the end it was concluded that the experiment was not working, and New Math fell out of favor before the end of the decade.
 
Fifty years later, I have one remark – Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
 
A simplified, head to head comparison of New Math and STEM:
 
Threat
According to Obama, “The hard truth is that for decades we’ve been losing ground. One assessment shows American 15-year-olds now rank 21st in science and 25th in math when compared to their peers around the world.” This time we aren’t just worried about the Soviets, but 20 other countries. Yikes.
 
Origins
In 1957, the National Science Foundation began to examine and promote change in secondary school education in math, biology, chemistry, and social sciences and was the primary backer of New Math. In 2009, the National Science Foundation launched the STEM Coalition for more reform.
 
Language
New Math proponents suggested that New Math should be taught as a language. More specifically, like language, it should be considered a liberal art, a key to clear thinking, and a logic for solving social as well as scientific problems. A White House sponsored YouTube video on STEM suggests, “science, technology, engineering and math are the new language…STEM allows you to deal with many of the pressing issues that the general population will have to deal with.”
 
Crisis
Jeffrey Miller, in his 1990 editorial, concluded of New Math: “The villain, if there is one, might be the country’s penchant for the 'quick fix.' Had Sputnik not flown…experimental programs might have evolved slowly and carefully into a national curriculum; as it was, they were shoved to center stage, lavishly financed, and told to perform a miracle overnight. They couldn’t, so the country passed on to the next educational fad, labeled the previous one a failure, and blamed it for low-test scores and a decline in skills.”  Today, STEM is responding to a “crisis” (just Google it), that needs a “quick fix,” and the hope seems to be an overnight miracle.
 
While I applaud the momentum behind the movement - STEM might be fundamentally flawed. And this time, we don’t need to wait for a Tom Lehrer satire song (have you heard New Math?) to course correct.

 
The crisis isn’t just one-dimensional.
Newsweek’s July 2010 issue highlighted another dimension. We are in a creativity crisis, not simply an engineering one. The European Union declared 2009 as the Year of Creativity and Chinese faculty actually laughed when they found out the US education trends were in “standardized curriculum, rote memorization and nationalized testing.” “You’re racing toward our old model. But we’re racing to yours as fast as we can.”
 
The market cannot meet the immediate demand for qualified teachers. The National Council on Teacher Quality recently released a report that stressed, “In reality, the concept of the all-purpose science teacher not only masks but perpetuates the STEM crisis, and does so at the expense of students.” If we learned anything from New Math is that an ideology with a shaky foundation typically falls. The point is, it’s almost a non-starter when the teachers are fast tracked to meet demand, but often do not have the rigor or depth to impart the subject.
 
This doesn’t account for the New Work-ers needed
The PEW Charitable Trust recently issued a report on the “New Work” that will drive economies. “The creative jobs that drive innovation are now the highest ‘value added’ jobs in the world—the real creators of wealth. So if states are going to stay competitive, they have to…develop a workforce capable of doing creative work.” While the report acknowledges that creativity doesn’t just come from artists – it will include STEM professions like chemistry and geography - there are approximately 170 occupational classifications that make up “New Work.” These can be grouped into five major threads—based on the types of knowledge, skills and aptitudes needed—that weave throughout the economy: Creative, Education, Social, Technical and Strategic occupations. Based on that prediction, STEM appears to account for roughly 1/5th of the training that is needed.

Why not STEAM’D?
My disillusionment with STEM developed when I saw their roster of possible careers. Heavy on typical math, chemistry, engineering and some computer science, you see no mention of, say, architecture (someone will need to move our country toward sustainable design), communication (who’s designing the future social networks other than Facebook?), visual and interaction designers (what’s beyond the tablet?) and product designers (they will be tasked with designing mass-scale temporary shelter for the increasing number of natural disasters.) As a matter of fact, you don’t really see design mentioned at all. It’s rather clear that Sir Ken Robinson wasn’t asked for his advice by the STEM coalition, nor was Daniel Pink, author of A Whole New Mind. STEM’s biggest flaw, and one we keep enduring, is casting a shining light on all things engineering, and relegating art and design to a dusty corner. I still remember my mom’s suggestion to skip art (my natural inclination) and instead take something more practical - like writing and typing. Her suggestion was excellent for 1988 - before the Internet, before “user interface design” was a career, and before touch screens. Well, we are in another "before" moment and I hope we aren't looking back 50 years from now with a sad little shake of our collective heads.

The truth is, our biggest innovations come from the combination of art and science. A perfect example of this approach was one taken by Microsoft researcher Byron Cook and featured in Wired Magazine’s December 2009 issue. He partnered with an artist friend, Tauba Auerbach, and together, they sketched out nine symbols, each of which describes a function not easily communicated in existing notation. The implications of this, according to NAMTA are profound, “If you ever wanted proof about our prediction that the 21st century would be known as the century of images, this is a major first step. Letters and numbers are closely related, but symbols are a step across the abyss towards artistic images. Art, in the form of symbols, is the only thing that could express the intent of the code writers, where letters and numbers couldn’t.”
 
In the end, it is not so much that STEM may fail like New Math, rather it may be missing its biggest opportunity. History’s unique benefit is hindsight and I look to what we learned from New Math to rethink how we might approach STEM. Fifty years ago Ralph Raimi suggested that the first purpose of educational reform was to change the climate in the hierarchy of education so that our descendents would be able to advance the “true cause.” Each generation will have its own true cause, of course, to be heavily debated. However, I’m hoping we can all agree on one thing – that the future is unknown, the rate of change is increasing and we need to train our brains for a flexibility that can only be achieved by playing with our potential. The right way is never one way and our challenges are not one-dimensional. So why are we approaching the future that way?
 
If STEM is to ever be relevant, perhaps it should take a cue from this YouTube video called, New Math, sung by 16-year old Bo Burnham. “Mathematical minds make industrial smog. What’s the opposite of LNX? It’s Duraflame the unnatural log.” 
 That's what you get when a guy is STEAM'D. Playful relevance. 

And, just in case you're into numbers...as of March 7, 2011, the White House youtube video on STEM has 4,203 views.

Bo Burnham's video: 7,114,711.