Seattle Central’s innovative approach to teaching pre-college math
In early September, the Seattle Times highlighted Seattle Central in an article exploring the ways community colleges are changing how math is taught to non-traditional students. KING5 also covered a similar story for a segment in its morning weekday broadcast. Both pieces focused on Statway, a program developed by the Carnegie Foundation that includes a sequence of statistics-focused courses instead of traditional math courses.
Seattle Central is one of 19 colleges nationwide that have adopted this program. Accompanying the feature article was a guest piece written by Statway instructor Paul Verschueren, who reflected on why it is a good alternative for non-traditional students.
“It’s more like real-life math,” said Applied Behavioral Science bachelor’s degree student Shayla Martin, in speaking about Statway for the Seattle Times article. “It’s the first time I’ve ever used the word ‘interesting’ to describe a math class.”
Statway is just one of several pathways that Seattle Central math faculty have been working to tailor to better meet students’ pre-college math needs. They have also developed an online assessment and learning system called ALEKS (Assessment and Learning in Knowledge Spaces) that incorporates self-paced learning to allow students to complete up to three pre-college math courses in one quarter. They have also adjusted the roster of pre-college math classes to meet students’ needs based on whether they intend to enroll in a STEM or non-STEM major.