The study of mathematics is an essential part of every student’s education, but it can pose a challenge for educators. Math is cyclical, repetitive, and builds upon itself. If a student misses a crucial lesson about long division, they’ll struggle throughout the entirety of their mathematics education trajectory until their misunderstanding is corrected.
Thankfully, there are many tools available in the district toolbox to provide strong mathematics instruction and remediation, like team-teaching models for leveled instruction, hiring policies that require strong instructor math skills, tutoring resources, and rigorous, research-based curricula choices.
Those tools haven’t always been present in Minnesota classrooms, especially for low-income students.
Mathematics grade-level proficiency, as measured on the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment (MCA), was declining pre-COVID for all students. Post-COVID, those declines continued and become far more pronounced.
The gap between low-income students (students who qualify for free or reduced lunch) and the statewide average remained about 20 percentage points wide. The steadiness of that gap is cause for concern; both overall achievement for low-income students and the statewide average have declined by about 15 percentage points in the past 10 years.
In 2025, only about one in four low-income students could do math at grade level.
Minnesota has done well in passing the READ Act, which is designed to revitalize early literacy education. It’s time for Minnesota to do the same for mathematics. Every student, especially the low-income ones, need math education reform and renewal.