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The term “Eureka” has never aligned with lasting truth. The Greek term meaning, “I have found it,” was credited to the Greek know-it-all Archimedes, who is said to have uttered the term when he discovered the theory of buoyancy while taking a bath, enabling him to deduce that a presumably gold crown was actually a silver crown. However, a 2006 Scientific America article lays doubt as to the truthfulness of this tale.
Nearly 1700 years after Archimedes’ bath, gold was discovered in California. “Eureka!” they cried. Much of that turned out to be “fools gold.” Then more fools cried, “I have found it,” as gold was discovered in a town they named Eureka, California in 1850. They put the name on the state seal. After the U.S. Army used the town as an outpost to massacre Indian women and children, the town became a ghost town.
Jumping forward to 2021, Harford Public Schools cried “I have found it,” and Eureka Math became the gold standard for the district’s K-5 math curriculum. You can tell where this story is going.
Eureka Math is the brainchild of the non-profit group, so-called, Great Minds Inc. These folks with great minds say it’s “the most widely used math curriculum in the U.S.” They say that Eureka Math is a “holistic” approach to teaching and learning math. However, math by its nature is holistic, so this sales pitch is not to be taken as a visionary trait of the curriculum. Seriously, how many companies make the game Monopoly?
In 2022, the National Center for Education Statistics released a report entitled, “The Condition of Education,” where it’s stated that nationally, 41% of 4th graders, 34% of 8th graders, and 25% of 12th graders were meeting or exceeding NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) standards in math. This is for a nation where Eureka Math is “the most widely used math curriculum.”
Eureka Math was born when polymaths were amazed at the consistently high scores on international math assessments by students in Singapore. They deduced that this must be due to the math curriculum and textbooks used, the “Singapore Math” model. So, with funding from the New York State Education Department, The Eureka Math model, originally called “ExhangeNY,” was written as a “reverse-engineered” version of Singapore Math.
Eureka math takes a common core based “sequential” and “systematic” approach to teaching and learning math, heavy on stories and reading comprehension. What does this mean? It means that if you have a district full of chronically absent kids who are not reading at grade level, you may be crying, “I have lost it,” and the students and the district take a bath.
What HPS leadership finds attractive about the Eureka curriculum is the assessment theory behind it: it’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game. Show me someone who believes that, and I’ll show you a loser. Despite the district’s rhetoric, this will me more of the “soft bigotry of low expectations” found in Superintendent Torres-Rodriguez’s district.
Eureka math is focused on the mathematical process and the thought process to solving a math problem, rather than getting the correct answer. Student work is not graded, and the system’s assessments do not generate overall scores. The curriculum is focused on the “progression” of the student toward “illuminating” understanding. Sounds like Zen and the Art of Math.
The curriculum recommends a subjective-based 4-step assessment approach, which superintendents will twist into some sort of on-track metric for evidence of success, while kids are still failing mandated state and federal assessments.
According to Great Minds, Inc., the 4-steps of assessment are:
Step 1: Student shows little evidence of reasoning and does not get the correct answer.
Step 2: Student shows evidence of some reasoning but does not get the correct answer.
Step 3: Students shows evidence of some reasoning and gets the correct answer, or, student shows solid reasoning but does not get the correct answer.
Step 4: Students shows evidence of solid reasoning and gets the correct answer.
Imagine the professional development required so that teachers can subjectively identify whether the reasoning shown is “little evidence of,” “some,” or “solid.” It’s like being a little bit pregnant.
Some folks swear by the curriculum, others swear at it.
HPS leadership thinks so highly of the curriculum, which they began using in 2021-22, that they recently required non-math teachers to attend a professional development session on the matter. A PD session which resulted in the teachers raising concerns and questions about the curriculum (imagine that), which apparently rubbed the presenters the wrong way and they fired off a very strongly worded letter to an administrator wanting to know why HPS teachers were not following the Superintendent’s script and leaping onboard with this curriculum. Those damn teachers, they would never fit on the HPS Board of Education.
Dina Marks, Principal at Booth Hill Elementary in Shelton, CT, gives great credit to Eureka Math for her school being named as a state School of Distinction, “the growth we saw in the students was amazing.” Shelton Schools has a 15% chronic absenteeism rate and consistently ranks at 70% or better on the state’s ELA assessment.
Parents in the St. Tammy Parish School District in Louisiana? Not so much. In 2014 they told the school board that the Eureka curriculum was “confusing,” “overly complicated,” and was “harming children” and had to go. Its strategies were “lambasted” as “confusing” and unnecessary.” It was eliminated from the school system.
Folks in Bartholomew, Indiana are excited about finding Eureka, and they will adopt it for grades K-6 next year. Unlike in Hartford, the Bartholomew school district formed a curriculum review committee of parents, teachers, ELA personnel, ed techs, and administrators to review Eureka. After 428 hours of review, the committee gave the curriculum a thumbs up as it ranked highest in 9 of 11 categories among the 3 vendors being considered.
The Hechinger Report, a national non-profit researching and writing on innovation and inequality in education, questions whether Eureka Math moves too fast for students. The Report states that the curriculum has its critics, including parents, teachers, and administrators who “lament” that it asks too much, too soon of students, even “confounding” some parents.
A math curriculum comparison chart put out by the folks at Rainbow Resource Curriculum Consultants in 2018, comparing nearly 50 different commercial curricula in areas such as approach, teacher involvement, standards alignment, and price, never mentions Great Minds, Inc.’s Eureka Math, “the most widely used math curriculum” in the nation.
The “lead writer” for Eureka Math, Louisiana State University mathematician Scott Baldridge, who refers to himself in the third person on his “About Me” blog page, and is of the type that calls his resume a “curriculum vitae,” wrote on his blog in 2016 how well schools will do if they partner with Eureka Math, and included the graph to the left showing the results for the New York state math assessment. The “good news just keeps rolling in,” he wrote.
The chart below reveals the state of New York and New York City trailing the nation in math assessment year after year from 2003 to 2022 while using Eureka Math, at least since 2014. The first wheel made by man rolled better.
EdReports, an independent non-profit that publishes free reviews of instructional materials, and which the Connecticut Department of Education called in its 2016 Report of the Commissioner’s Council on Mathematics, an “appropriate and effective” resource to support curriculum development, has given Eureka “high praise,” as has the state of Louisiana and Tennessee.
The charts below show how the folks in Louisiana and Tennessee are probably feeling like those who gave up the farm and headed to Eureka, California for the dream of hitting the 19th century version of the Powerball, only to return broke and defeated. Despite the long-term use of Eureka Math, more than 60% of students are unable to advance beyond the basic level in Louisiana state test scores in each grade 3-8. In Tennessee, nearly 70% scored below expectation levels on their state math assessments.
Tennessee state assessment test results, 2021-22. This chart depicts statewide math success rate across the four possible performance levels: Below Expectations, Approaching Expectations, Met Expectations, and Exceeded Expectations.
Despite Hartford Public Schools’ Mathematics Mission stating their goal is to develop a “focused, coherent, rigorous, and engaging” PreK-12 mathematics program, they show that they have been using various resources from various vendors to create a mathematics stew. Comprised of resources from Eureka Math, Carnegie Learning, Achieve the Core, Desmos, YouCubed, Zearn, and the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM), it appears that HPS’ math program has been unfocused and incoherent. Is it any wonder math is like Greek to most Hartford children.
Connecticut does not require districts to use an approved curriculum, they only require that it meets state content requirements and common core standards, stating in Chapter 170, Sec. 10-16(b) that the district “offers at least the program of instruction required pursuant to this section, and that such program of instruction is planned, ongoing, and systematic.”
At a March 24, 2020 Special Meeting, HPS stated that they “inherited curriculum that was internally developed.” Speaking as if the leadership team in place had just walked through the door but which had actually been in place since 2016. So, the Board of Education approved the Superintendent’s proposal whereby TNTP (The New Teacher Project) would do a $290,000 curriculum audit by examining instructional materials used in K-12. At this time HPS stated that Eureka has been “vetted,” and though it may be more expensive, it’s current and “proven.”
As to the “proven” part of this lipstick sale, we have seen the questionable nature of that claim. As to Eureka having been “vetted,” we must ask how and by whom? Not once has Eureka Math come up before a Board Committee for their review, nor has it come up before the Regular Meeting for a contract approval. Hartford’s Board of Education is kept out of the loop as to curriculum decisions, and by extension, so have parents and teachers.
In January 2022, a presentation to the Teaching & Learning Committee state that a contract was needed for Zearn, for $49,999, to provide “K-8 curriculum, resources and training,” while also stating that $1.2 million would have to be paid to ANet (Achievement Network) for “support with evaluating and adjusting instructional materials to ensure they are standards-based and grade-level appropriate.”
The Zearn contract never came to the Board for a vote due to its conveniently being written for a dollar less than the $50,000 required to trigger a Board vote. By the time ANet came up for approval, in June of 2022, the price tag had gone up to $1.3 million.
This was at the same time the state of Connecticut was rolling out its own grade 6-8, free, math curriculum and financial literacy curriculum, in May of 2022, five months after HPS paid $49k to Zearn for “K-8 curriculum, resources and training.” The state’s math curriculum is described as being “developed by teachers for teachers.” So naturally, Superintendent Torres-Rodriguez had no use for that. The ANet contract was approved with the statement that they “will work with district leaders to develop and execute a curriculum implementation plan…related to the implementation of the new grades 6-12 math curriculum” for 2022-23.
Seven months later, during budget discussions at a Committee of the Whole meeting in February 2023, Chief Financial Officer Phillip Penn stated that the budget for 2023-24 proposes a $6 million line “mostly” for the “new” math curriculum “implemented” in 2021-22 for K-5, and the “new” grade 6-8 math curriculum planned for “next year” (2023-24), and for the K-12 “literacy” curriculum for “next year.”
We’ve got “new” curriculum overlapping “new” curriculum, grade specific curriculum overlapping grade specific curriculum, nothing named, and $1.3 million being paid to the only winner in this mess, ANet, to be driver of the curriculum bus. Amidst it all we have the state releasing its own curriculum which apparently doesn’t fit with the HPS’ District Model of Excellence (DME).
The “new” K-5 curriculum Mr. Penn refers to is, I assume, a new comprehensive Eureka curriculum. The cost of which, according to Mr. Penn, makes up “most” of the $6 million. Safe to assume that “most”/”mostly” is more than half? For that kind of money Eureka should be the only player in the HPS mathematics field, and ought to include guaranteed compliance with common core standards and a plan for execution so that HPS is not muddying the waters with overlapping services from vendors such as ANet. This would go along way to achieve HPS’ mathematics mission of a “focused” and “coherent” curriculum. I mean, if indeed that is the agenda.
The earlier mentioned Bartholomew School District in Indiana is paying $1.3 million for Eureka Math for a student body of 6,113 in grades K-6. Most likely HPS’ snookered price is the result of additional resources being added on to the basic curriculum cost, in the form of an army of “coaches” who will be deployed to tell veteran teachers how to teach the “new math” and how to apply the “new assessments,” based on the theory of horseshoes and hand grenades; close enough counts.
If this sounds to you like an algebra problem gone terribly wrong, you’re not alone. Despite the millions paid to curriculum and instruction consultants such as TNTP, ANet, and ReVisions Learning, to gauge the fidelity of instruction, the lack of school leadership has created a mathematics program that appears to be grasping for the next best thing to present itself to academically struggling district cash cows like Hartford, resulting in unsustainable, bad investments.
Now, if the Board of Education had a Curriculum Committee, where curricula had to be really “vetted,” precisely named, selected from among optional vendors, with precise price tags rather than adverbs such as “mostly,” then much of the fog that lingers in our mind and which is blocking the vision of school leadership, may be lifted. Not that the current Board would actually make great use of such a committee, but someday… The State of Connecticut actually requires such a committee:
Sec. 10-220 (3)(e) Each local and regional board of education shall establish a school district curriculum committee. The committee shall recommend, develop, review and approve all curriculum for the local or regional school district.
Writing for EdReports, Denise Rawding, Ed.D and New Jersey school board member, states, “School boards play an important role in curriculum adoption and ensuring teachers and students have the resources they need. Especially given the realities of COVID-19, school boards must be informed about a district’s instructional materials options. A critical responsibility of a local school board is to approve curriculum that will be implemented across a school district. Very often board members are informed at the end of the adoption process.”
Through a shared, balance of power legal orthodoxy, local school districts have the power, within state restrictions, to set their own curriculum. Thus, fair play and justice makes it sensible for a school district to share power and require its local school board to take part in the development of or selection of, and to approve any and all curricula. Board Bylaws (9321(g)-(h)) state that the Teaching & Learning committee shall “advise the Board of Education on matters relating to teaching and learning, including the instructional programs used in the district’s schools,” and shall “work cooperatively with the superintendent and appropriate staff to monitor and assess instructional programs…” Eureka!
According to the Cambridge and McMillan dictionaries, “you do the math” is an idiom used for telling someone that when they consider all the evidence, something is not possible or cannot succeed. Should HPS be crying “Eureka?” You do the math.
For further Eureka reading:
1. Rigidity and pacing: Critics argue that Eureka Math's strict pacing and emphasis on mastery of individual topics can lead to a lack of flexibility in adapting to students' diverse learning needs (May, 2015).
Reference: May, M. (2015). Eureka Math: A Review of the Research. University of Central Arkansas.
2. Parental involvement: The curriculum's unfamiliar language and methods may make it difficult for parents to assist their children, leading to frustration and confusion (Bennett, 2017).
Reference: Bennett, R. E. (2017). The Parental Experience of Eureka Math. Journal of Mathematics Education Research.
3. Student engagement: Eureka Math's heavy emphasis on procedure and repetition may lead to disengagement and loss of motivation for some students (Larson, 2018).
Reference: Larson, M. (2018). Eureka Math: Balancing Rigor and Engagement.
4. Lack of differentiation: Critics argue that Eureka Math does not provide enough support for students with diverse learning needs, including English Language Learners (ELL) and students with learning disabilities (Irvine & Cottle, 2019).
Reference: Irvine, S., & Cottle, M. (2019). Differentiating Instruction in Eureka Math: Challenges and Opportunities. Mathematics Teaching and Learning Journal.
5. Time-consuming lessons: The curriculum's lessons can be time-consuming, which may lead to teachers feeling rushed and having difficulty covering all the material (NCTM, 2020).
Reference: National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM). (2020). Eureka Math: A Time Analysis. NCTM Research Report.
6. Insufficient assessment tools: Eureka Math has been criticized for not providing adequate formative assessment tools to monitor students' progress and inform instruction (Baker et al., 2021).
Reference: Baker, K., Smith, L., & Thompson, P. (2021). Assessment in Eureka Math: An Analysis of Tools and Practices. Journal of Mathematics Assessment.
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