When I was a boy, I loved numbers, and I still do. Only when I was a sophomore at Princeton did I shift my attention from mathematics to literature, in part because the same part of my mind that loves…

America’s amazing technological achievements, such as SpaceX’s recent rescue of stranded astronauts, mask the death spiral of math learning in the U.S., which has reached an ignominious low with Harvard’s decision to offer remedial math. On the 2024 National Assessment…