Mathematics Colloquium
Math Professors Jen Szydlik and Steve Szydlik
Tuesday, April 29, 2025, 4– 5 p.m., Swart 101

The global pandemic that began in earnest in the United States in 2020 transformed mathematics teaching and learning across the nation. Wisconsin schools were not exempt from the impacts of COVID-19, and the disruptions brought on by remote learning have continued to echo in our students since that time. In a fall 2024 sabbatical project funded by the Universities of Wisconsin, we interviewed 32 high school mathematics teachers from across Wisconsin about their experiences teaching during and since the global pandemic. In this talk, we describe those experiences and highlight teachers’ observations of their post-pandemic students’ mathematical work, behaviors, and attitudes. We also report on state-wide trends by providing quantitative data on college readiness and student engagement among our state’s high school students. These data provide a context for understanding the challenges faced by our UWO mathematics students and for a discussion on how best to support them.