How did people learn math when they were all together – all ages, all experience levels – all in the same classroom? Used to be all together in one, single-room schoolhouse, usually painted red, now sometimes all together in one Zoom room – with no paint at all! What happened back then was that the more experienced students helped explain things to those with less experience. That is what we will get to do here at Evergreen-Tacoma. Each one will help at least one of their classmates learn some things, no matter what level you believe you are at. Math is not just about numbers and computations. It is more about organizing, creating categories in which to sort things, looking at relationships – between people and between ideas. Now don’t get me wrong, we will also get to improve on computations – math is also about numbers! So get ready for a math class like no other that you ever imagined! Much more friendly, much more civilized, much more open to new ideas that you bring to the class! No matter where you want to begin thinking and learning, we will have a book and a place for you!
As the great civil rights activist Bob Moses said, quality math education is a basic civil right! This cannot become effectively true (for the population) until the educational system that inflicts trauma on its students is transformed and (for the individual) until we can face our experienced trauma, transform it, and are able to move on. So the road through math for liberty and justice for all of us includes the transformation of our trauma so that it does not block us from progressing.