USELESS HIGHER MATH
15 Years Later, Ms. King’s Algebra Class Still Has Never Needed To Have Learned Polynomials
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An annual study of Ms. King’s former 8th grade algebra class from 2008 has confirmed once again that not a single one of her students has ever actually needed to know how to solve polynomial math problems.
“You’ll never know when you might need to know this,” was Ms. King’s favorite phrase to pacify the apathetic math students. She would then point to a poster tacked on the classroom wall picturing a mansion on the beach with a giant garage filled with five sports cars. Beneath the mansion was the phrase “Motivation for higher math.”
But it appears that the entire class has literally never needed to know how to solve polynomial equations at any point in their lives since middle school.
“It’s bullshit,” said former student Sophia Turner. “I knew she was lying. I knew from the day I brought my homework home and no one in my family knew how to help me with it. Not my mom, not my dad, not any of my aunts or uncles, none of my older cousins. My grandpa told me to tell Ms. King to ‘F off’ because he didn’t need to know how to solve polynomials when he was shooting Nazis in northern France. My uncle then chimed in that the Viet Cong sneaking around in the jungle had no clue about polynomials, yet they still managed to beat America.”
Other students explained how they specifically chose their career paths in order to not need to use higher mathematical skills.
“Ms. King made me realize I hated math and that I didn’t want to waste my time in college learning superfluous left-brain concepts like how to draw a circle on a graph from an equation,” said former student Thomas Bates. “And I may not have five sports cars yet like her poster suggested, but I have two already. I owe my success to street smarts, not higher math. Ms. King’s poster should have featured a mountain of cocaine, that’s how I made my fortune. And I didn’t realize at the time how little teachers make, but I was probably making more money in high school selling weed after school than Ms. King’s salary. Maybe Ms. King should have been teaching her classes all these years how to launder drug money, because that’s how I got ahead in life.”
