Writing in the blog Bacon’s Rebellion, Arlington parent and self-described “Obama Democrat” Todd Truitt has come out swinging against a Virginia budget amendment to spend $12 million extra “to improve student performance in mathematics.”
His argument? Without Governor’s amendments, these extra funds won’t help math outcomes and will probably hurt.
Mr. Truitt’s main point is that it offers school divisions “blank checks totaling almost $10.2 million … to continue promoting the math-ed equivalent of whole language/balanced literacy.” That’s a lot of money that runs the risk of following millions more tossed down a rabbit hole of faddish math pedagogy over the last nine years opposing, for example, memorizing the “times tables.”.
But as noted in 2023 by the late Rick Nelson, who served as a Visiting Fellow at the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy, “University of Virginia cognitive scientist Daniel Willingham explains that math is about more than fact memorization. but as a foundation, because of the brain’s structure, for all the basic arithmetic facts (such as 8 + 7 and 42/6), answers must be “not calculated but simply retrieved from memory.”.
Yet, as former teachers union president Nelson documents, in 2016 Virginia moved away from the practice of practicing math facts. The result was that, by 2024, Virginia ranked 46th in Math recovery from the effects of not teaching math facts and from school shutdowns during Covid.
Who was first in the nation? Alabama. Which may be why the two-page Virginia budget amendment adapted some of the language in the 61-page Alabama legislation to improve mathematics. But left out of that budget amendment (and leaving it nothing more than a cash flow for school systems), says Mr. Truitt, were the components that actually made Alabama instruction effective: Requirements for evidence-based instruction, based on cognitive research, that will improve student outcomes.
This is an old conflict between those who favor solid instructional foundations before moving on to higher levels and those who seem to favor a more “organic” pedagogy. It is often also a conflict between those on the front lines of teaching in the classroom and representatives of professional teaching associations who frequently haven’t been in a classroom for years.
In 1986, when the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics recommended calculators in elementary schools, math teachers stood outside their convention protesting. Local school systems like Fairfax County resisted using math books like Saxon Math, despite their positive impact on low-income students.
The same was true for reading. The International Reading Association (now the International Literacy Association) dismissed the idea of requiring students to read even just a single book over the summer as “negative.” Principals resisted even having phonics-based books on hand. And when Fairfax County Public Schools confiscated old phonics-based reading books, replacing them with “whole language” texts, veteran reading teachers, dedicated to doing what worked, hid their old volumes for classroom use like so many samizdat.
This began some 40 years ago, and as the effects have become clearer and clearer, some semblance of bipartisan reform has started to show itself. The Virginia Literacy Act, signed into law by Governor Youngkin and co-sponsored by Senator Louise Lucas (D-Portsmouth) and Delegate Carrie Coyner (R-Hopewell) took effect this past fall, requiring the use of evidence-based reading instruction to teach younger children. Critical in its passage was the backing from Northern Virginia chapters of the NAACP, whose children had suffered under poor reading instruction for decades.
The same imperative exists when it comes to 4th and 8th grade math instruction. Just as a child will be hobbled if he or she does not command phonemic awareness by a certain age, so too will they be left behind if they do not have automaticity in simple equations and even more complex algorithms.
A budget hawk would simply line-item veto the $12 million. The General Assembly is unlikely to command a 2/3 vote to override it.
But that would still leave Virginia students lagging in math recovery. A more effective action is in order … and one requiring only a simple majority in the legislature to sustain it.
With his final budget now entering the last stages of approval, this is a last opportunity for Governor Youngkin, who has done much to re-create a culture of high expectations, to similarly ensure that Virginia utilize evidence-based numeracy instruction to improve student outcomes.
Rather than merely spending millions of dollars on questionable practices – too often the “default” position — Virginia should define and embed “evidence-based numeracy research” into the budget. Through amendments and follow-up Executive Orders, the Governor can make certain that teacher professional development, teacher training, school division grants, and the composition of mathematics advisory task forces consistently reflect what actually works in education.
And while those amendments must be sustained by a General Assembly that has frequently proven to be oppositional, when push comes to shove a majority has voted not only for reading reform, but also in favor of cell phone bans and against …barely … delaying changes in the new, more rigorous accountability system.
Political adversaries should be given benefit of the doubt when it comes to education and be asked to ensure math instruction is synched with the reading instruction that received their unanimous vote.
And should they have any doubts themselves, they should be shown the data and asked why they would want to do nothing about it.
Chris Braunlich is Senior Advisor and former President of the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. He is a former president of the Virginia State Board of Education and former member of the Fairfax County School Board. He may be reached at chris@thomasjeffersoninst.org.
