
When Academic Disagreement Becomes Harassment and Persecution - adrianhoward
http://www.stanford.edu/~joboaler/
======
droithomme
Bullying in the workplace is a big problem and it turns out that smart people
are not exempt from participating.

Kenneth Westhues is a leading expert in the field, having studied the practice
extensively, which he calls "mobbing". He has published several papers and
books about it.

Some references on the topic:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullying_in_academia>

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Westhues>

<http://arts.uwaterloo.ca/~kwesthue/mobbing.htm>

The game is often played until the selected victim quits, commits suicide, or
in some rare cases, snaps and comes to work with a gun.

------
kcl
Let's see what they're fighting about. From Boaler's complaint:

"[...] research evidence that could be used to improve the mathematics
achievement of students in the United States and beyond [...]"

From her critics' paper (Bishop, Clopton, Milgram):

"This study makes extremely strong claims for discovery style instruction in
mathematics, and consequently has the potential to affect instruction and
curriculum throughout the country."

ftp://math.stanford.edu/pub/papers/milgram/combined-evaluations-version3.pdf

Both sides agree that a positive research result has the potential to alter
mathematics education in the country. Then the question is: what's true, that
Boaler has found a way to substantially improve education, or that her
analysis is flawed?

~~~
evolve2k
Surely the correct response is more research and preparation of further peer
reviewed papers?

------
rhansen
Consider the time that has elapsed in this drama. I have found very few
schools that, had they achieved the results claimed in Boaler's study, would
not make it very public. How can you turn an urban school around, let alone,
have it surpass other schools and not broadcast it to the world?

In science, things become fact by proving them again, again, again, and again.
Not by doing one study, claiming stupendous success and that be the end of it,
as seems the case in education research.

Without the Bishops, Milgrams, and thousands of frustrated parents, who would
provide critical review of these studies? There are dozens of NSF studies
claiming success, all with a different methods. I have hunted down most of
them and none of them appear in the context of high performing mathematics
classes. Like honors algebra or AP calculus where the students score 4's and
5's. It seems that in the education research community, especially in the NSF
funded scam community, there is an unwritten rule that researchers do not
criticize each other. Boaler seems to be pinning her hopes in this letter on
that rule.

If you were Boaler and you possessed the secret to turning around the
mathematics attainment of low performing urban schools, would you...

A. Continue to produce stellar results at even more schools? B. Spend ten
years arguing with Bishop and Milgram?

Bob Hansen

------
columbo
It appears to have been in the semi-public view for quite a long time. Was
there ever any action taken?

Other related info:

<http://mathforum.org/kb/message.jspa?messageID=715422>

<http://www.nychold.com/rev-bishop-0302.html>

    
    
          In 2006 Milgram claimed that I had engaged in scientific misconduct.  
          Milgram and Bishop attempted aggressively to identify my research subjects    
      
      

That's unacceptable. If either of those are true they should be stripped of
their titles and degrees.

~~~
droithomme
<http://www.nychold.com/rev-bishop-0302.html>

Is this the actual bullying or is it something more than this?

This particular article by Bishop is not bullying, it's standard academic
criticism and it's very reasonable.

If this is representative of the actual issues, then that seriously changes my
opinion of what is going on here.

If this is the worst of it, I strongly recommend that everyone read this book
review and decide for themselves if Bishop is a villain who is unfairly
bullying another academic.

------
ChristianMarks
I'm not surprised by this academic misconduct. I've met many mathematicians
who are hostile to teaching methods not of their own invention. I suspect this
comes from a belief that superior mathematical ability implies superior
empirical judgment, especially on matters of pedagogy; it also may stem from
intellectual independence and unfamiliarity with or suspicion of empirical
methods in the social sciences. This doesn't stop the opinionators. Sometimes
they embarrass themselves in writing. One imbecile wrote in a Springer
Undergraduate Text in Mathematics on linear algebra that one should be a fast
note taker. The implication was that less than fast note takers would and
should be left behind. Another esteemed author of a book on Fourier Analysis
wrote that his book was not intended for the struggling student--a gratuitous
and fatuous comment.

~~~
dubya
Mathematicians can definitely be opinionated, but a lot of the problem lies
elsewhere. The "suspicion of empirical methods in the social science" is
actually pretty well justified, for example the recent replication studies
flap in psychology.

In education, I haven't seen any studies showing a marked superiority of a
particular teaching method. Sometimes a new idea shows promise, but the
effects evaporate when someone else tries it. So Boaler's results were
enormously surprising, and it was reasonable to ask for verification. And then
it turned into ugly politics.

~~~
tom_b
You might be interested in skimming the following paper:

njrp.tamu.edu/2004/PDFs/Collier.pdf

This is a entry-level paper investigating dual-language instruction. These
researchers are looking at student outcomes and how dual-language instruction
improves those outcomes more than other approaches. It's also not
_particularly_ advocating an instructional method that the researchers are
claiming ownership of.

The abstract:

"Our longitudinal research findings from one-way and two-way dual language
enrichment models of schooling demonstrate the substantial power of this
program for enhancing student outcomes and fully closing the achievement gap
in second language (L2). Effect sizes for dual language are very large
compared to other programs for English learners (ELLs). Dual language
schooling also can transform the experience of teachers, administrators, and
parents into an inclusive and supportive school community for all. Our
research findings of the past 18 years are summarized here, with focus on
ELLs’ outcomes in one-way and two-way, 50:50 and 90:10, dual language models,
including heritage language programs for students of bilingual and bicultural
ancestry who are more proficient in English than in their heritage language."

More germane to this discussion, in the paper there are links where the
methodology, data collection, and data analysis are discussed in-depth. The
authors also call for more specific and follow-up research on "program
evaluation research, to refine what particular forms of dual language programs
are most effective."

The TL;DR results: "Enrichment dual language schooling closes the academic
achievement gap in L2 and in first language (L1) students initially below
grade level, and for all categories of students participating in this
program."

That's a pretty bold claim, that dual language instruction can bring below
grade level student test performance up even for native language speakers.

If we can isolate pedagogies or aspects of dual language instruction that lead
to better student outcomes, it would be nice if those approaches could be used
in math education.

~~~
dubya
Thanks for the link. It seems like the bold claim is supported by a ton of
data, as it should be. If this was what Boaler was offering, I think she would
have a much stronger case. I skimmed some of the papers on Boaler's site as
well, and they are almost completely unlike this one. They are full of
anecdotes and quotes from students and very little data. To be fair, her study
that is cited her later papers is not available on her web page so I have not
read it.

------
tokenadult
I've been following the "math wars" for years, and used to be a regular
participant in some of the email lists with messages quoted by other
participants in these threads. I've read writings about mathematics education
by Boaler and by Milgram, and have used those for preparing the mathematics
classes I teach locally, and I have had a lot of email correspondence (mostly
on email lists) with Wayne Bishop. I'm amazed that the root page of Boaler's
faculty website at Stanford is being used for this kind of writing. I'm trying
to get to the bottom of the actual facts involved. For that purpose, I'm
sharing this same link among my Facebook friends, who include several
innovators in mathematics education.

I appreciate the links that droithomme has shared in this thread. Yes, there
is a lot of passion about what should be done to improve mathematics education
in the United States, and one of the chief issues of contention is how to
gauge the effectiveness of new programs. I'm pretty satisfied with the results
of the homeschooling materials I chose for my oldest son (who is now a
programmer for a startup). Over the years I've learned a lot from some of the
same friends I'm asking for responses to this link. I hope we can puzzle out
who is really coming forward with better evidence about what effective
mathematics teaching is, because the United States could certainly use better
mathematics instruction than it now has.

------
askimto
No rebuttal of concerns in the "paper" except to say that it was improper to
identify the schools?

No explanation of why she contacted the police about Wayne?

No explanation of why she apparently thinks hosting a not-peer-reviewed paper
online is wrong?

No sympathy from me.

~~~
ktizo
I bet she must be really dissapointed that you have failed to show concern for
her in this. Your personal sympathy was probably the one thing she was really
counting on. "Where's askimito?", she'll be asking. "I was planning on asking
him/her/other to champion my education reforms!", she will then shout, while
wondering if how she will possibly get through another day without this
fountain of online approval.

------
cjbprime
Looks like someone else has a very similar complaint:

[http://mathforum.org/kb/thread.jspa?forumID=206&threadID...](http://mathforum.org/kb/thread.jspa?forumID=206&threadID=482509&messageID=1476271)

------
dkarl
_Milgram invited me to his office and told me not to talk about my research
results in America as American teachers are “too weak” to be able to work in
the ways shown to be effective._

If you believe there are harmful truths that should not be published, you
don't belong in research. You belong in a PR department. I know exactly what
this guy Milgram is getting at: in my experience as a student, progressive
methods were occasionally wielded effectively by a few of my best teachers,
but most teachers used them to take a break from engaging with the material
and puff up the grades of the kids who were struggling. That's no excuse for
wanting to hide research that shows innovative methods _did_ work under
certain circumstances, especially since research documents _what those
circumstances were._ Anyway, like I said, if you believe there are harmful
truths that should not be published, you don't belong in academia. That would
disqualify virtually everybody outside the hard sciences, of course, and
probably many people inside the hard sciences as well. ("So what if
dihydroxomayonnaise isn't an effective twinzoblane above bike pants
temperature? If we get distracted by that the field will be set back five
years! Dihydroxo-condiment studies _needs_ this grant money!")

It's hard to tell when bullying in academia is just a dramatic word for
politics. People fight to entrench certain ideologies and stigmatize others,
professors fight over control of departments, careers are threatened or
ruined. I knew a girl in college who had her Master's thesis written and
practically approved. Then her advisor suddenly left the department, and her
advisor's vanquisher told her the paper was unacceptable _in toto_ and had to
be rewritten from scratch. My friend had been pondering an academic career,
but this made up her mind: she got her MA by examination and decided against
graduate school (she got the MA at the same time as her BA.)

You can't overlook that one guy in this story had the campus police show up at
his home because he said "nuke 'em" with respect to schools of education. This
raises two questions. First, by this standard, how many people here have been
careful enough with language to avoid police investigation? Second, can you
imagine the pressure that must have been put on the police to force them to
take time away from their real work because one faculty member wanted to
stigmatize another as potentially violent? The other justification for co-
opting the police into this dispute was "personal attacks on my work," which
doesn't pass the smell test; if you don't distinguish between personal
criticisms and criticisms on your work, then you _will_ feel under personal
attack all the time. That's a choice. You can separate personal criticism from
professional criticism and label the former inappropriate, but if you don't
make an effort to distinguish the two, don't come begging for sympathy.

So here we have two groups of academics: each casting aspersions on the
others' research; each trying to sabotage the others' careers; one group
calling the other dishonest and the other group responding with accusations of
bullying and illegal conduct. Both sides have accused the other of subverting
academic integrity, by data fabrication on one side and by trying to identify
research subjects on the other. I think both sides are doing a splendid job of
bullying, no doubt glowing in the self-righteous pleasure of fighting against
evil. I think I know which side I would agree with about the research (though
it _might_ not be a coincidence that I tend to agree with the one side whose
case has been presented to me) but I wouldn't say one side was better than the
other just by virtue of being right about the academic point they're fighting
over.

EDIT: It was bugging me to have only one side of the story, so I did a quick
google search. It isn't much, but perhaps it's better than nothing:
[http://mathforum.org/kb/servlet/JiveServlet/download/206-116...](http://mathforum.org/kb/servlet/JiveServlet/download/206-1167514-3866987-217284/att1.html)

I think the safest conclusion here is that we have two people engaged in your
usual petty no-holds-barred academic playground fight. I'm prepared to believe
that they're both harmless and both completely civilized in any other context.
Getting the authorities involved still strikes me as creepy, but they were
just campus cops, so I'm prepared to see even that as childish harassment
rather than a serious threat.

~~~
jlgreco
Does anybody else find this part odd?

 _"This is an allegation that could have destroyed my career had it been
substantiated."_

Surely the point here is that the allegations are troubling _because_ they
could not be substantiated, not _despite_ that. Had they been substantiated,
the authors career would indeed have be be destroyed, but the author would
deserve no sympathy and Milgram no criticism.

This is a factual statement that does nothing to reinforce sympathies with the
author, _unless_ perhaps you don't read it critically. It seems to me to be an
emotional appeal.

~~~
dkarl
Yeah, the allegations are flying fast and thick between these two, and nobody
is impressed who doesn't have a political stake in the outcome.

------
wisty
From what I can tell, Jo's work is based on how low socio-economic-status
(poor black / latino) students have trouble in standardized exams when there
are questions like:

"A cable crew had 120 feet of cable left on a 1000-foot spool after wiring 4
identical new homes. If the spool was full before the homes were wired, which
equation could be used to find the length of cable (x) used in each home?".

~~~
ktizo
I think it might be based off a fair amount more than that, she's been
publishing since 1993.

~~~
jackfoxy
Don't know if @wisty or @ktizo is right here, but _she's been publishing since
1993_ is not a logical argument.

~~~
ktizo
Ok, she's been consistently publishing in academia since 1993 and was asked
back to her job at Stanford after leaving to become Marie Curie Chair of
Mathematics Education. If her research didn't cover a lot more bases than was
suggested, then I don't think she would have held either of those academic
positions.

~~~
jackfoxy
Resort to authority. One of her adversaries is a retired Stanford prof. I'm
not taking one side or the other here.

~~~
ktizo
Well, the guy you are referencing has taken no position that we know of here,
as far as what we were currently referencing, so I call shenanigans.

