There’s Fear Of Math. And Then There’s Fear Of ‘Russian Math’

There’s fear of math. And then there’s fear of Russian math, a K-12 enrichment program co-founded by an émigré in her Newton dining room in 1997. It has since grown to 32 locations in nine states and an online program, and along the way earned a such a reputation for intensity that some parents use it as a threat. “If your attitude doesn’t improve,” Mary Lewis-Pierce of Jamaica Plain told her fourth grader, “I’m sending you to Russian math.” By her own admission, Lewis-Pierce has no firsthand knowledge, but she’s heard about Russian-math induced tears. Hours of homework. Impossibly hard equations. “I picture mean Russian women teaching math in some gulag,” she said.

Boston globe.com