How I Almost Didn’t Fail Algebra
Math Requirements Ended My Hopes of College. Are They Good Public Policy?
Algebra was responsible for the first F I ever got.
While I was never a straight-A student, I wasn’t a screw-up either. But tell that to Mexican-immigrant parents who dropped out of school after first grade and took pride in seeing their offspring get the education they never had. I’ll never forget that dreadful parent-teacher conference in seventh grade or the silence in our minivan on the way home. There was no congratulatory feast at Shakey’s Pizza that night, as I was about to enter an academic era marked by one …
