UC San Diego: Incoming Students Can’t Do Basic Math

Math professors are ringing alarm bells about the rapid and disastrous decline in students’ ability to do even basic math. 

Almost 15% of incoming students cannot perform math at the 1st-grade level, and fewer than one out of five can perform math at the 8th-grade level. 

These are college students at a fairly prestigious university, many of whom have achieved very good grades in math prior to graduation. They have been awarded good to great grades without being able to do the most basic math. 

It’s astonishing: https://t.co/NlAqYCpZnK

— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) November 12, 2025

We’re not talking about students having trouble dealing with calculus or Algebra II. Many students cannot do basic addition and subtraction, and only 54% of incoming students can do 5th-grade math. It’s gotten to the point where professors in the STEM fields are overwhelmed and unable to provide college-level courses to students in…college.

The report focuses on the decline of math skills in particular.

They recently tested a group of their students.

Here are the percentages of students who correctly answered questions at each grade level: pic.twitter.com/SO7ny4BwJi

— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) November 11, 2025

The situation was awful before COVID, but it has rapidly deteriorated since. Students have not only failed to catch up to the poor level of achievement they displayed prior to the pandemic, but they continue to decline in ability. 

This chart documents the increasing number of students placed in remedial math (math 2 and math 3b): pic.twitter.com/ZUDLljkSZr

— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) November 11, 2025

Imagine the situation: a prestigious college is now having to teach nearly 20% of its students how to do 1st grade math, and about half need instruction to exceed the 5th-grade level. Only one out of five has even attained high-school level math literacy.  

Another reason is the elimination of standardized test requirements coupled with high school grade inflation: pic.twitter.com/BuPczCfWN1

— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) November 11, 2025

No wonder every kiosk that asks for a tip informs you of the amount for each level. Nobody can figure out what 10% or 15% of $10 is. 

UCSD’s “Math 2” course teaches grade-school math (grades 1–8) to freshmen. From page 49 of the university’s own report:

• 25% of students got 7 + 2 = ___ + 6 wrong
• 61% of students, a large majority, couldn’t round 374,518 to the nearest hundred
• 37% of students couldn’t… https://t.co/GGDvrF5AIy pic.twitter.com/2WepqqnmWp

— Chris Brunet (@chrisbrunet) November 11, 2025

No doubt that Democrats will blame funding, because they always blame funding. But the simple fact is that the public education establishment has been performing child sacrifice on the altar of woke ideology, ingesting gobs of money that gets dumped into salaries, employing teachers with little to no skills in their disciplines or in teaching, and has been lying to students and parents about how well students are doing. 

Fast Fact: Gavin Newsom moved to a posh neighborhood to enroll his kids in a private school that costs $60,000 per year – while opposing private school vouchers and school choice

Gov. Newsom has four kids and he makes about $215,000 a year, and just purchased a $9.1 million… pic.twitter.com/WTFl9RbEuZ

— Denise Aguilar (@InformedMama209) August 1, 2025

Newsom has consistently resisted private school vouchers and school choice through policies that  prioritize public schools, including: 

🟥Newsom vetoed bills that would expand voucher-like programs or tax credits for private education. For instance, he has supported restrictions on charter schools – which critics say slashes charter funding by up to 30% – to limit parental options and protect union interests.

🟥During the pandemic, Newsom kept public schools closed longer than many states while allowing private schools (including the one his children attended) to reopen for in-person learning.

🟥He opposed federal efforts to expand school choice. In 2025, he signed an executive order providing temporary school choice for wildfire victims by waiving residency requirements – but many questioned why this option wasn’t offered to all.

🟥Newsom and other top Democrats – like Biden, & Pelosi – sent their children to private schools but actively fought against voucher programs that would make similar options accessible to lower-income families.

🟥During a potential 2026 ballot initiative for school choice in California, Newsom opposed it emphasizing investments in public schools instead.

🟥Critics, held a hearing on school choice, directly calling out Newsom for “waging war on parents’ rights” while his own children attended a $60,000-per-year private school.

Blue states like California and Illinois have been waging a war on students and a war on school choice, which would empower parents to move their kids out of failing schools. 

Governor J.B. Pritzker attacked school choice and said its supporters “can F*CK ALL THE WAY OFF.”

He went to private school.
He sent his kids to private school. pic.twitter.com/YKusZRFN9k

— Corey A. DeAngelis, school choice evangelist (@DeAngelisCorey) November 11, 2025

Democrats know exactly what they are doing. They also know that teachers’ unions represent five million people and are one of the most reliable voting blocs for them. Kids in schools can’t vote. 

It’s an easy call for them. That’s why they kept schools closed, poured billions into pandemic relief for school districts (which spent almost none of the “relief” on anything related to the pandemic), despite being warned that students were being permanently harmed. 

Public school funding has gone up 280% since 1960.

Grades, meanwhile, have stayed almost exactly the same.

Most of said funding has been spent on …. administrators. Not teachers. Not resources. Just paper pushers.

Shocker, more bureaucracy isn’t at all helping outcomes. pic.twitter.com/NIPHrWkvYf

— Hannah Frankman Hood (@HannahFrankman) November 22, 2024

Grades have remained steady, but performance has not improved. It is going down now, by a lot. 

This week, a math professor at MIT told me that incoming students are, on average, noticeably worse at math than they used to be.

Harvard, of course, just added a remedial math class, Math MA5, “aimed at rectifying a lack of foundational algebra skills among students”. https://t.co/crqrw1jw78

— Patrick Collison (@patrickc) March 23, 2025

The Democratic Party is all about child sacrifice, all the way from the womb forward. Whether it is abortion until birth, the push to sterilize and mutilate children, or train them in socialist ideology, schools do everything but teach. Liberals are even trying to make schools one-stop medical and social service centers, after presiding over a massive increase in mental health problems due to “Social and Emotional Learning.”

Public schools aren’t just a national disgrace; they are a danger to our continued existence as a modern society. Shut down the system and give scholarships to parents to pay for better schools, or home school for kids. 

Editor’s Note: After more than 40 days of screwing Americans, a few Dems have finally caved. The Schumer Shutdown was never about principle—just inflicting pain for political points. They own this.

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