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How do we ensure that AI enters our classrooms as a supplement to human engagement, not a substitute for it? And, most urgently, are we trading away the very skills that make education worthwhile in exchange for the appearance of efficiency? These are the questions that every caregiver, educator, school board member, and policymaker should be demanding answers to before another policy is instituted.

Having worked for years to advance policies that expand math opportunity, I was troubled by the media’s myopic focus on a tiny portion of high school graduates entering a single highly selective university. The UCSD story seemed to be viewing the state of math education through a pinhole camera. 

Just Equations and our partners will be lending our voices and our expertise to inform this process and ensure equitable and accessible math preparation for students across California. Based on years of analyzing math preparation, one thing is clear: The absence of standardized tests did not cause declines in student math preparation, and reintroducing tests will not reverse those declines.

As we look toward next month’s 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Juneteenth, referred to as America’s second Independence Day, serves as a continual reminder of the long road to freedom for Black people in our nation. 

For years, Just Equations has been recommending to colleges that they accept a range of advanced high school math courses for admission and limit any preference for calculus to students whose majors require calculus.