The Montgomery Journal
Wednesday, August 15, 2001

County students world-class in math? Think again     
ROBERT ROSENFELD, Potomac
    Editor's note: Robert Rosenfeld is a board member of the Montgomery
County Gifted and Talented Association and has children in the public schools.

Gerald Bracey says that Montgomery County's students are learning
mathematics at a world-class level. (``Whatever standards, county students
measure up,'' Letters, July 27). It wasn't even close.

    My evidence for this is the Third International Mathematics and Science
Study's 1999 Benchmarking Report (TIMSS-1999). This report states that ``the
world-class performance levels in mathematics were set essentially by five
Asian [school systems]'' - Singapore, Korea, Taipei, Hong Kong and Japan.

    So let's see how we compare with the top Asian systems:

    The highest level of achievement, the top 10 percent of the TIMSS
test-takers, represents students who can solve complex, nonroutine,
multi-step problems. Nearly half (46 percent) of Singapore's students scored
at this level. They were followed by Taipei (41 percent), Korea (37 percent),
Hong Kong (33 percent) and Japan (33 percent). The lowest of these
world-class Asian results is about twice as high as Montgomery County (17
percent). Two other U.S. school districts - the First in the World Consortium
(22 percent) and the Naperville, Ill., School District (24 percent) - also
outperformed Montgomery County.

    A high level of achievement, the top 25 percent of TIMSS test takers,
represents college-prep mathematical understanding of fractions, decimals,
geometry and algebraic expressions. Singapore had 75 percent of students
score at this level or better, followed by Hong Kong (68 percent), Korea (68
percent), Taipei (66 percent) and Japan (64 percent). Montgomery County (45
percent) was far behind the world leaders and even the top U.S. participants,
Naperville (59 percent) and First in the World Consortium (56 percent).

    The lowest level of achievement, reached by the bottom 25 percent of
TIMSS test takers, represents a basic ability to do only simple arithmetic
computations (e.g., add, subtract and rounding whole numbers). Ninety-nine
percent of students from Singapore, Hong Kong and Korea and 98 percent of
students from Japan, as well as and 95 percent from Taipei displayed this
level of achievement.

    Ninety-five percent of Montgomery County students achieved this basic
level. However, Montgomery was one of only two U.S. entities (Guilford
County, N.C., was the other) that excluded the maximum number of students
(e.g., special education) they could get away with under the TIMSS guidelines
- a whopping 254 students out of a random sample of 1,481. In contrast,
Singapore excluded none.

    Here is another perspective: The average student in the top five Asian
school systems scored as well as our gifted students, those who took
eighth-grade algebra. Our very best students, the 3 percent of our students
who take geometry in eighth grade and algebra in seventh, were matched by a
quarter of the students in Singapore and Taipei.

    The TIMSS data clearly show that the Asian systems set the standard for
world-class math, while Singapore is the gold standard.

    That's why the Illinois First in the World Consortium school districts
benchmarked their math (and science) standards not only against the Illinois
state standards and assessments, but also those of Singapore, Japan and the
highly rated California standards.

    But then, the First in the World superintendents had the vision to aim
higher than their state standards and the integrity to keep their word.