Math. How important Really is it?

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Nic Gulizia, Editor

As you sit in math class listening to the teacher lecture, you begin to wonder: How can I possibly use this in my life? In your eyes, it’s just another day of what you believe is useless math. What if it was more than just that?

 

One of the most prominent topics among students today is math and how important it is when it comes to your future education and life. Many claim that math is useless and has no use in their future life, while others claim that you gain vital knowledge from high levels of math. Math has its pros and cons, helping out each and every person in a different way. So how exactly does math support students in the real world?

 

Math problems, formulas, and textbook math are actually not some of the more important aspects of math. “The skills that I learned in terms of critical reasoning and critical thinking, I use that every day,” 9th-year math teacher Christopher Lu said. So it actually isn’t the math itself that matters as much, but more the skills that you can apply to other areas of your life.

 

The collection of data and learning how to analyze has become more and more important as technology advances even more. “What are they doing with this data? Well, they’re analyzing it. How are they analyzing it? With math,” Lu said. Data uses mathematics to correctly analyze it from places such as the apps on your phone. 

 

You may ask: What math classes specifically help you the most in the real world? Ari Greenberg-McClung, a 5th-year math teacher, explained the subjects most commonly applied in the real world. “Everybody in real life will definitely use skills that they learned in Algebra I and even Geometry,” Greenberg said. In many scenarios, the more important skill to grasp is the way of thinking, not the actual topic.

 

Many students firmly believe that they won’t use advanced math at all, which is understandable. The majority of students in high school won’t. “Advanced math like Calculus, Pre-Calculus, and Statistics, from the student body at Gunderson, maybe around 10% [will use those types of advanced math],” Greenberg said.

 

“People don’t think about it, but everything in the world involves math, including the houses you live in, the bridges that you’re crossing, and the screens that we’re looking at all the time nowadays. All that is designed with math behind it,” Greenberg said.

 

Finances are a very popular subject among high school students. They want to learn about how they work and how to better understand them so it can benefit them later in life. “I do think that we should have a financial math class as a 4-year option,” Greenberg said. “I really wish our school offered that instead of the AP courses or Pre-Calculus because there’s definitely a need for that.”

 

Math can benefit students a whole lot more than they may think. Whether it’s measuring area and perimeter as a construction worker or applying Calculus as an engineer, math can be useful in more ways than not. It’s everywhere, and it’s here to help you out.