Tatiana Melguizo serves on national committee on developmental math
Pullias Center faculty member Tatiana Melguizo is lending her expertise to a national committee with the goal to help students succeed in post-secondary math courses.
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine named Melguizo to a committee to plan and conduct a public workshop for stakeholders in math education titled Increasing Success in Developmental Mathematics. As a part of the nine-member group, Melguizo helped put together and participated in the two-day event in March, delving into the latest research and promising approaches for improving student outcomes in mathematics.
(UPDATE: Resources from this event are now available as a free download or can be ordered in paperback)
“We have learned, overall, that developmental math policies of the past have not been very effective, and have especially negatively impacted low-income and students of color,” said Melguizo. “This workshop was an opportunity to bring together the people who have been working on this issue—–the scholars, the leaders, the math faculty, and the experts from all around the country—–to say, we know what hasn’t worked in the past, and we know there’s a lot of experimentation happening at the present. So what do we now? And what is the agenda for the future?”
As an associate professor of education at USC Rossier and the director of the Math Equity and College Completion project at the Pullias Center, Melguizo brings many years of research on developmental math education and policies to the NAS Committee. Over the last five years, she has been working on a research-practitioner partnership with the Los Angeles Community College District.
She has received grants from the National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Research and the College Futures Foundation for her work in this field, and has previously lent her expertise to groups such as The Century Foundation, where she is a fellow.
At the workshop, experts and faculty advocated for moving beyond developmental math and placing students directly in college level math courses, with the appropriate levels of support to help them succeed. Many state and local educational systems have already revised their math placement and education policies accordingly, and stakeholders in the field are eagerly waiting to see the outcomes of these changes, according to Melguizo.
“The workshop was extremely exciting, and we learned a lot from what’s going on all around the country,” Melguizo said. “My goal is to continue to build on this knowledge in order to understand what the effects of recent policy changes–—which basically got rid of developmental math—–will do, specifically in California. When we get rid of something that has been a staple for the long time, and we give the colleges an opportunity to redesign the curriculum and engage in active and culturally-relevant pedagogies, we need to watch closely to see what the changes are, how they are being implemented, and most importantly whether they are positively impacting student success, and produce equitable outcomes.”
To learn more about the Increasing Success in Developmental Mathematic workshop, and to download commissioned papers and watch a video of the proceedings, visit the NAS event webpage.