Math at Exeter
By WILLIAM INOUE ‘27
Coming to Phillips Exeter Academy, many pleasant and unpleasant surprises were waiting for me. I came from a small international school in Japan where we had a textbook system of math to follow. It was a MYP system that included presentations and papers about math. I consistently scored full scores in every criterion and was at the top of my school for math. Yet, I felt through then the lack of self-involvement and self-guided learning in the class. It felt like the teachers had everything planned for us, and all we had to do was sit there and wait to be fed the steps. It was much easier to consistently score higher grades because, with an absence of self-directed learning, passive learning becomes increasingly trivial.
From that math curriculum, I began to wonder what an optimal math curriculum would be like. The most optimal would provide the most value to students with their time on the material. Despite its arbitrary definition, this guideline would serve its purpose in dissecting the issues with a passive mathematics program. The core problem was a lack of student engagement. At moments, especially in the eighth grade, it felt like the students were unnecessary to the class as the teacher would recite a speech, and the class would end there. There was almost no homework or tests. Such a system severely limited my abilities to perform at a high level. As a result, my confidence in math shattered as I went from consistently scoring full marks to being placed in 12T in my prep year.
During my first math class at Exeter, I was pleasantly surprised that the teacher did not speak once while presenting our solutions to the problems. If it were my old school, the student presenting the question would have already faced numerous criticisms for not following the “correct” solution. I was more surprised to find that the homework for the next day was just the questions we would present then. This cycle of solving the problems, then presenting the problems in class and discussing it among students gives Exeter math its value. To me, this method of learning math provides me with the most value of the time I spend. I find that it solves all the issues I’ve had with learning math at my old school.
So now, why does Exeter’s math curriculum receive so much criticism from the students? Prior to writing this article, I discussed this matter with numerous students and heard that they did not enjoy nor felt that they were learning from how Exeter was teaching math. They would cite that the teachers would not “teach” the material in the books, and the students would not do the homework, essentially halting the discussion. Yet, those criticisms often overlook large portions of the class. Throughout my four terms at Exeter, I have not experienced a single teacher who was unwilling to go out of their way to ensure I understood the material. All four teachers would step in during class to have their “teaching” moments, during which they would provide a different or alternate view of the solution on the board. It may be because I have had good luck with my teachers. However, my argument still stands that the criticisms layered against the math curriculum most often stems from the fact that students fail to do their homework since teachers act like moderators of the class, not active participants.
As mentioned above, the entire Exeter math curriculum relies on how much students complete their work. This is directly tied to the fact that we learn based on discussions and sharing of our thoughts. Most of the criticisms against the math department fail to consider that because the math is so self-led at Exeter that they aim such liabilities against themselves. I find it an honorable attempt to bring Harkness to math and create a holistic math curriculum. To truly discover the potential of Exeter math, we must take a step back and realize how we are treating and approaching it ourselves.
