As colleges and universities across the country moved to offer math pathways that were more relevant to student goals, a large number of students who might, in the past, have been directed toward College Algebra or Precalculus were now finding themselves in a Statistics pathways. In Washington Community and Technical Colleges, students in many degree paths including Allied Health and Social Science pathways are being directed toward Statistics.
Over the last decade, a large number of colleges have invested in redesigning their precollege math courses that lead to Statistics realizing that the algebra intensive coursework that was designed for students on a pathway to Calculus was not the appropriate preparation for Statistics. Some colleges developed these sequences as simply pared down versions of the traditional pathways while others introduced new content based on backward design from statistics and took the opportunity to make significant course design and pedagogical reform.
Within the last few years, an increasing number of colleges have begun implementing and designing corequisite courses for Introduction to Statistics in an effort to even more closely align student supports with the college level Statistics content that students will need to be successful in their degrees.
Materials from Previous Work
December 9, 2020: Corequisite Learning Community Focus on Statistics
Colleges currently developing or implementing corequisite courses for Math& 146 were invited to join the monthly Corequisite Learning Community meeting to share are learn from each other.
2017 MPC Statistics Working Group
In 2017, statistics instructors in Washington state from two- and four-year institutions met as part of a working group of the Math Pathways to Completion Project. The work, led by Helen Burn, MPC co-chair, led to a set of content recommendations for Introduction to Statistics (Math& 146):
MPC_Math&146Recommendations_Dec2017
For more information, see Burn’s Curriculum Research Group website.
There are plans to assemble a statewide group in 2021 to continue this work.
Other Resources
Dana Center Curricular Materials for Statistical Reasoning – An adaptation of STATWAY available through Pearson.
STATWAY – Statistical reasoning courses offered by Carnegie Math Pathways.
Washington Math Pathways 