Before she got to the math in her lesson on linear equations last fall, Sydney Kealanahele asked her class of eighth graders on Oahu why kalo, or taro root, is so important in Hawaii. What do you know about kalo, she asked them. Have you ever picked it?

A boy who had never spoken in class, and never seemed even slightly interested in math, raised his hand.

鈥淗e said, 鈥業 pick kalo with my grandma. She has a farm,鈥欌�� Kealanahele recalled. 鈥淗e was excited to tell us about that.鈥�

Class discussion got animated. Everybody knew about poi, the creamy staple Hawaiian food made from mashed taro. Others had even noticed that there were fewer taro farms on Oahu.

That鈥檚 when Kealanahele guided the conversation to the whiteboard, plotting data on pounds of taro produced over time on a graph, which created a perfect descending line. The class talked about why there is less taro production, which led to a discussion about the shortage of farm labor.

Kealanahele had taught eighth-grade math for six years at a campus of the , but this was the first time she had started a lesson with a conversation about farming. The idea came from professional development she鈥檇 just completed, in ethnomathematics, an approach that connects math to culture by embedding math in a story about something relevant to students鈥� lives.

Ethnomathematics isn鈥檛 new, but until recently it was limited to a niche area of educational and anthropological research on how different cultures use math. Over the past couple of decades, it has evolved into one of several efforts to create more engaging and inclusive math classrooms, particularly for Black, Hispanic and Indigenous students, who tend to  than their Asian and white peers. Ethnomathematics advocates say that persistent achievement gaps are in part a result of overly abstract math instruction that鈥檚 disconnected from student experience, and that there鈥檚  for new approaches that recognize mathematical knowledge as it鈥檚 practiced outside of textbooks.

Many Black and Brown students don鈥檛 feel comfortable in math classes, said Shelly Jones, professor of math education at Central Connecticut State University. She said those classes tend to be 鈥渃ompetitive鈥� and that teachers 鈥渉one in on what Black and Brown students don鈥檛 know as opposed to honoring what they do know.鈥� She added: 鈥淲e are trying to pull in students who have not traditionally felt they belonged in math spaces.鈥�

That said,  on the impact of ethnomathematics is limited, and its practice is largely confined to individual classrooms 鈥� like Kealanehele鈥檚 鈥� where the teacher has sought out the approach. And teachers who incorporate ethnomathematics without the right support and instructional tools risk stumbling into a cultural minefield, experts say. Most teachers in U.S. classrooms are white. If one of those white teachers decides their Hispanic students should learn base-20 Mayan numbers, and their students ask why, the teacher will have to come up with an answer, said Ron Eglash, a professor in the University of Michigan鈥檚 School of Information.

鈥淭elling kids, 鈥楤ecause it鈥檚 your heritage,鈥� sounds really awkward from a white teacher,鈥� Eglash said.

But experts say that high-quality ethnomathematics lessons boost student confidence and engagement when used by teachers (of any race) who have been trained and who allow students the time to explore the material on their own and through discussion.

Ethnomathematics falls under the same umbrella as culturally responsive math instruction. Experts say that teaching math this way requires teachers to get to know their students and create a learning environment where students can connect to math concepts. It involves developing lessons that reveal the math in everyday activities, like skateboarding, braiding and weaving. It can also include exploring the math involved in cultural practices, like beading.

鈥淎 lot of this work is about removing barriers or perceptions from a marginalized population that math is something the Greeks created and is imposed on me,鈥� said Mark Ellis, a professor of education at California State University, Fullerton. He said that culturally responsive instruction takes other measures into account, besides academic outcomes, when determining impact. These include students鈥� attitude about math, sense of belonging in math classes and engagement in math discourses.

Traditional math instruction, Ellis said, is treated as if math were acultural, even though, as we know it in the U.S., math descended from the computational traditions of many places, including Mesopotamia (360-degree circles), ancient Greece (geometry and trigonometry), India (decimal notation, the concept of zero) and China (negative numbers). If these mathematical traditions are taught, Ellis and others ask, then why not Hawaiian calculations for slope, sub-Saharan fractal geometry and Mayan counting systems?

Eglash argues that ethnomathematics lessons aren鈥檛 just for students from the culture that the lessons draw from. It鈥檚 important that students explore math concepts from all cultures, including their own, he said.

Ethnomathematics, a term coined in the 1970s by Brazilian mathematician Ubiratan D鈥橝mbrosio, first appeared in the U.S. about 25 years ago. That鈥檚 when Eglash and his wife, University of Michigan design professor Audrey Bennett, developed a  by which students learn the history or context of a practice 鈥� , for example 鈥� and then use algebra, geometry and trigonometry to create their own cornrow designs with software.

Eglash and Bennett designed the teaching tools with the idea that students can use a module to create their work, which can mean mixing cultures. A Puerto Rican student used Eglash鈥檚 module about Native American beading to .

In 2009, Richmond City Public Schools asked Eglash and Bennett to teach a module called Cornrow Curves to a class of Black 10th graders. Eglash asked the class where cornrows came from. Their answer: 鈥淏rooklyn!鈥� That led to discussion about the African origins of cornrows 鈥� where they indicated marriage status, religious affiliation and other social markers 鈥� and on through cornrows鈥� history during the Middle Passage, Civil Rights, hip-hop and Afrofuturism.

Only then did the students begin doing math, designing their own cornrows, noticing how the plaits get closer together or further apart depending on the values students enter in a simulation. One student created a design for straight-line cornrows by visually estimating how far to space them apart. In her presentation to class, Eglash recalled, she said that 鈥渢here are 12 spaces between the braids on one side, which covers 90 degrees, so the braids are positioned every 7.5 degrees because 90/12 = 7.5.鈥�

The Cornrow Curves module and other lessons like it have now been adopted by districts in 25 states. The Los Angeles Unified School District, for example, began offering a culturally responsive computer science curriculum in 2008 that incorporates ethnomathematics lessons that Eglash and Bennett developed. Some evidence indicates that this course helped boost student participation in computer science: An  found that enrollment in the classes rose by nearly 800 percent from 2009 to 2014.

In 2012, Chicago Public Schools adopted the same curriculum for an introduction to computer science course and invested in significant professional development for teachers. In 2016, the course became a graduation requirement for all Chicago high school students, and 250 teachers are trained each year on the curriculum.

An outside analysis of the Chicago program showed that students who took the course before taking AP computer science were  to pass the AP computer science exam than those who only took the AP course. A separate study in Chicago and Wisconsin showed that where the course was offered  and that students were  to take another computer science class.

Keily Hernandez, 15, a first-year student at Chicago鈥檚 George Westinghouse College Prep High School, was happy to see the computer science course on her schedule this year, because she plans to major in computer science in college. At first, she found the cornrows module challenging 鈥� getting the designs to look the way she wanted them to look was difficult 鈥� but it was also fun, she said.

The class is collaborative, she said, and students often turn to each other or to the internet for ideas and help. Hernandez said that taking the class has relieved her doubts that she can be a computer scientist.

鈥淭he class made me reassured,鈥� she said. 鈥淢ath isn鈥檛 something that you just know, the same way that computer science isn鈥檛 something that you just know. You get better at it the more you do it.鈥�

It鈥檚 students like Hernandez that Linda Furuto wanted to attract when she took the job as head of the math and science subdivision at the University of Hawaii West Oahu in 2007. At the time, student enrollment was so low that the school offered just two math courses. Furuto, who had grown up on Oahu and received her Ph.D. in math education from the University of California, Los Angeles, recalled thinking, 鈥淭his isn鈥檛 working. We need to implement ethnomathematics here.鈥�

Over the next six years, she began to integrate ethnomathematics into coursework, and student interest grew. By 2013, the university offered more than 20 math classes.

鈥淪tudents would say things like, 鈥業 hated math. I felt no connection to it. But now I see that math is my culture and because of that I want to be a secondary math teacher,鈥欌�� Furuto said. 鈥淛ust knowing that the life of a student has in some way, shape or form been transformed speaks volumes.鈥�

In 2018, by then a professor of mathematics education at the University of Hawaii Manoa, Furuto established the world鈥檚 first . So far, about 300 teachers have participated in the online program; about half are from Hawaii.

While teachers in Chicago get ongoing professional development in cohorts both before and while they teach the district鈥檚 ethnomathematics-based computer science course, educators who complete the University of Hawaii program are highly likely to be the only teacher at their school with this niche training.

Sydney Kealanahele, the teacher on Oahu, said that as inspired as she was by the ethnomathematics program, she doesn鈥檛 have time to teach using the method more than twice every three months.

鈥淭o create a really good lesson that feels authentic to me, and not just thrown together,鈥� she said, 鈥渋t takes time to do the research.鈥�

For a teacher who doesn鈥檛 have colleagues in their school using the same approach, it can be hard to fit in something new like ethnomathematics, said Janel Marr, a math resource teacher in Oahu鈥檚 Windward School District. Marr was one of the first teachers to participate in the ethnomathematics graduate program, as an eighth-grade math teacher. Today she teaches in the graduate program.

鈥淲hen you go back to the classroom, there are so many other things from all sides, from administration and curriculum to state tests,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t starts to get overwhelming. It鈥檚 not being implemented as much as we in the program would want it to be.鈥�

Ideally, said Eglash, ethnomathematics content should be related to real-world situations, even if that involves exploring painful periods of history. Where possible, content should connect with art, history, sports and math to provide multiple ways for students to interact. This is critical, he said, to address power dynamics and 鈥渋dentity barriers鈥� in the classroom, like the race of the teacher. When teachers let students explore content individually and through group discussion, students gain control over their own learning.

鈥淭he teacher finds a way to use the tool that is authentic 鈥� which is something the kids pick up on and respect, even for white folks,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 when you are trying to be something you are not that teaching becomes awkward.鈥�

Doing ethnomathematics right can also engage teachers, Marr said. She had been teaching eighth-grade math at Kailua Intermediate School for 13 years when she hit a wall. Her students would ask why they had to learn math, she said, and she didn鈥檛 have an answer. She was looking for inspiration when she heard about the University of Hawaii ethnomathematics program.

鈥淢y students would learn to work with the numbers and everything, but it wasn鈥檛 like they were making a connection of why there is slope,鈥� Marr said.

After earning her master鈥檚, Marr had the idea to approach linear equations in a new way. She showed her students a photo of a mountain with a long, bare line down its lush, forested side and asked if anyone knew what they were looking at. Most students didn鈥檛.

She wrote a word on the whiteboard: holua. The path, students learned from research they did in class, was made of gravel pounded into lava rocks, and it ran down the side of the Hual膩lai Volcano on the east side of Hawaii. Elite members of ancient Hawaiian communities sledded down mountainside paths like this one as part of the extreme sport known as holua.

鈥淲e talked about those pictures and talked about, well what would the slope be? How fast might they be going? Because slope is really related to the rate of speed,鈥� she said. 鈥淢ath isn鈥檛 just theoretical. It鈥檚 having an experience of being part of the place.鈥�

This story was originally published by , a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. 

Brooklyn Laboratory Charter High School can most certainly be counted among the borough鈥檚 hidden gems for its innovative approaches to challenges that now plague schools nationwide.

Getting students back on track to graduate. Decreasing absenteeism. Supporting students鈥� and teachers鈥� well-being, all while preparing for the end of pandemic relief funds next year.   

Two Brooklyn-raised Black women, who reflect much of the student body at the small 9th to 12th grade college prep school, are leading into a new era coming out of the pandemic, revamping the status quo that left many educators exhausted and students dissatisfied.

Leaders and staff went to the drawing board, mining for solutions that filled gaps and brought joy back into school. 

Brooklyn Lab Charter鈥檚 social workers visited nearly 100 homes to find students, as absenteeism soared post-pandemic. Each student has a personal advocate both at school and with their families, an advisor who starts each day with a non-academic meeting to build relationships and discuss health or current events over free breakfast. Free photobooths, music, dinner, sports and games await those who show up on-time at weekly 鈥淣o-Tardy Parties.鈥�

Two teachers now lead each class, at least one of whom is special education certified, as the school adopts an all-inclusion-model. Morning office hours and a 6-week night school offer more chances for students to bridge academic gaps made worse by the pandemic. Teachers are now paid to lead and attend professional development sessions. 

鈥淚’m really proud of the work that we’ve done to strengthen us where we need to be strengthened,鈥� said CEO Garland Thomas-McDavid, who became a career educator after growing up in a low-income Brooklyn neighborhood, becoming a teen mother and dropping out of high school. 

鈥淢ost schools are experiencing a lot of the same challenges鈥� Everyone was facing staff shortages, everyone was facing a great resignation.鈥�

Amid the uncertainty, she and her team are finding new solutions to provide rigorous academic opportunities for students of color and students with disabilities who are frequently ignored and left unchallenged. 

鈥淚鈥檓 not going to lower the bar,鈥� she said. 鈥淚’m not going to go quietly into the night because I always think, what about the parent who can’t speak up? What about the parent who doesn’t have the resources? What about the parent who doesn’t even know what to ask for?鈥�

Excellence is for Thomas-McDavid, a mother of five and parent to a 10th grader at Brooklyn Lab Charter. Having navigated special education services for her youngest, she knows how draining it can be for parents trying to advocate for what their children deserve. And being a native of East New York, where some students also live, she knows the difference schools can make.

The change at Brooklyn Lab Charter is palpable. Since October, the school has seen a 15% decrease in daily absences. Students and staff say students are more excited to come to school amid an almost-180 degree shift, after years of feeling flatlined. Nearly all, about 96%, of teachers are returning next school year.

鈥淚t was visible to some teachers that things had to change,鈥� said Jeckesan Mejia, dean of instruction. 鈥淭his year at every opportunity, we’re trying to implement feedback, changes, updates鈥� Just be in a space where we are not only reacting, but intentionally reacting.鈥�

Over a hundred students participate in nine new sports, from e-Gaming to basketball.  A washer and dryer is open to all and a prayer room was set up during Ramadan. 

Roughly 80% of teachers are Black or brown, serving about 450 students who are predominantly Black, Latino and low-income. 

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鈥淲hen you’re a school of this size, you have the ability to respond and cater to the community that you’re serving, and be more personable with the families that you meet, the people that you work with, and the staff that you hire,鈥� assistant principal Melissa Poux told 社区黑料.

The school鈥檚 high expectations have continued since the school鈥檚 inception. 

External partnerships bring students into college classes at nearby universities. Mandatory AP classes and a microeconomics course at a local college helped senior Daniel Shelton see a future in law. His time management skills got better; he learned how to keep focus and retain info from long lectures. 

鈥淚t really opened my eyes,鈥� Shelton said. 鈥淧rior to that, I would have really never known and been able to prepare myself to have the level of dedication to study 鈥� I had to devote all my weekends to it. And honestly I wouldn’t take any second back.鈥�

鈥淏ack in the Lab鈥�

Many of the Lab鈥檚 innovations this school year address multiple goals. 

In daily advisory, led by teachers or administrators, students discuss anything from mindfulness and health to current news and how to advocate for yourself. Low-cost 鈥淣o-Tardy Parties鈥� hosted in the gym help reinforce that school can be a joyful, positive place. 

Their inclusion model for special education also reduces isolation among students, while making classes more accessible and boosting teacher morale.

鈥淢s. Morales, my co-teacher, is not only my favorite person to work with but she has expedited my development more than I could even imagine,鈥� said first-year earth science teacher and pre-med advisor Branden Medary, who came to the classroom after a career in neuroscience and has bridged a partnership to offer aerospace workshops by New York University students.

鈥淚f I’m doing something whack, she will happily pull me aside and be like, 鈥楬ey, you can do this, this, or this. I know those to work. What do you think?鈥欌��

Co-teachers lesson plan together as well so lessons are modified to support students of all ability levels.  

Some families have come specifically because of its inclusive approach to supporting students with disabilities. 

Administrators and teachers at Brooklyn Lab Charter are leaning on each other, too. Staff get paid extra to lead or attend professional development sessions, and now have free access to a local gym. Academic teams are probing deeper into assessment data to see how more subjects can reduce gaps. 

At the start of this school year, math scores showed many students struggled with word problems 鈥� at its core, a literacy problem. 

English and history teachers built in more time for reading comprehension, while math teachers introduced a 鈥渨ord problem checklist鈥� to help students past initial panic and freeze-up: read the problem, restate what it鈥檚 asking, identify variables, etc. 

鈥淭he sheer fact that kids have the ability to check something off allows them to feel that progress, to be a little bit more resilient with what鈥檚 in front of them, and hopefully get to that last check.鈥� 

Teachers also offer morning drop-in office hours, usually more amenable to teen鈥檚 schedules, particularly those who work. 

Those who need to finish more credits to graduate than is possible during the school day attend a 6-week night school program. 

Cultural responsiveness in and out of the classroom

Innovations underway boil down to understanding students and their families 鈥� being culturally responsive. 

At Brooklyn Lab Charter, administrators, a few of whom spent years at larger network charters criticized for pushing students with disabilities out or cultivating rigid or racist cultures, embrace the bustle that comes with being a school.

Students are themselves in hallways 鈥� as loud or as quiet as they want to be. Through the glass walls of the once-office space, hugs, fist-bumps, waves and smiles abound. 

Though their adjustment to being fully back in person was challenging at first, students describe the environment as more engaging and challenging than their previous schools. That they still feel a sense of community, feel welcomed. 

When asked why, the differences that stick with them speak to their experiences and dreams:

In February, dozens of local Black professionals presented and met one on one with students at their first ever 鈥淪uccess Looks like Me鈥� , shaped by student input. 

鈥淚t’s not everyday that you find somebody from Coney Island who’s up there,鈥� said Brooklyn Lab Charter senior Jayla Eady, an aspiring dermatologist. 鈥淏eing that we’re from the same place, it shows that I can do it, too.鈥� 

Like all schools, Brooklyn Lab Charter is still working through challenges, including enrollment – which dropped by nearly 100 after they ended remote options this school year – and a $5 million decline in funding as ESSER funds expire in 2024. 

On the student side, attention spans are dwindling as students adjust to the daily grind.

鈥淭he only way to allow for the attention to come back is to make things culturally relevant, make things relevant to them and what they can literally walk outside of this building and utilize today,鈥� added Mejia.

Eleventh graders in Karen Asiedu鈥檚 AP Environmental Science course, learned about blood diamonds, cocoa farming, food supply chains and the Norfolk Southern train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio in the weeks after the AP exam. 

Anaya, a senior, compared her experience of walking into the building to showing up for family Thanksgiving: even if you didn鈥檛 know everyone beforehand, you fit in, feel comfortable and look after each other. Coming to the Lab after being treated like a nerdy outcast at her last school felt like a fresh start, a place where, 鈥淚 can maybe be who I am.鈥� 

鈥淚 feel very confident that like everyone that we’re in class with now will not just walk across the stage but be given their diploma,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hat’s what I like 鈥� I’m glad it’s a no one left behind type thing.鈥�

Disclosure: The XQ Institute provides financial support to Brooklyn Lab High School and 社区黑料.

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