Learning Math to Make Things Better

by John Stumpner

Making a change to make things better or help improve the lives of others can sometimes be difficult.

The people in charge sometimes don’t want the change or think that only they know what’s best.

Jaime Escalante was a math and physics teacher from Bolivia (a country in South America). In the late 1960’s, he moved to California, improved his English skills and became certified to teach. He was soon assigned to one of the poorer high schools in Los Angeles. The school administrators thought it was a waste of time to try to teach the students too much, and allowed the teachers to only teach basic math skills. Mr. Escalante first got in trouble with the school administrators when he made his students finish their homework or not be allowed in class. He found some students that wanted to learn more and started teaching them. He had to argue with the school administrators and the teacher’s union to offer the extra classes and spend the time and effort to help these students. Eventually, some of his students learned so much, they were able to take a college placement exam in an advanced form of math called calculus. The students scored so well on the exam, they were accused of cheating. No one thought students from a poor high school could do so well. Angry, Mr. Escalante pestered the company that ran the tests until his students were allowed to re-take the exam to show they weren’t cheating.

In spite of Mr. Escalante’s success in teaching and the successes of his students, he continued to face opposition from the officials in the school systems. Similarly, despite the successes of ABATE of Wisconsin in defending motorcyclist’s rights and the freedom of the road, we occasionally face opposition, sometimes from the people we are trying to help. When you see the number and variety of motorcycles safely traveling on Wisconsin’s roadways, you’ll see both why we continue and how successful we are in defending our rights.