WHO IS PROFESSOR B?
Everard Barrett has served as an Associate Professor in the Mathematics Department, State University of New York, College at Old Westbury from 1971 to 1997 and is the president of Professor B Enterprises, Inc. From 1962 to 1971, he taught junior and senior high school mathematics in Brooklyn, New York.

He is the author of the Professor B methodology for mathematics education and has conducted numerous interventions in elementary school mathematics education throughout the U.S. since 1973. Results, as substantiated by many statistical analyses and research, have been consistently strong. Over and over again, he has moved his projects through the cycle of implementation, teachers' feedback, statistical evaluation and revision.

In June 1976, after three years of experimental work in the Theodore Roosevelt Elementary School, Roosevelt, New York, he broke new educational ground by enabling fifth and sixth grade classes to significantly out-perform ninth graders (from the same community) on an examination traditionally reserved for the brightest ninth graders (The New York State Ninth Year Algebra Regents Examination) throughout the state. This was subsequently repeated on two occasions in P.S. 44, an elementary school within central Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, New York. Both Roosevelt and Bedford-Stuyvesant are very disadvantaged, low socio-economic areas of New York.

The accomplishment in Roosevelt exemplifies the power of Professor B methodology to lift levels of mathematics in low socio-economic communities to the highest levels of achievement. The following are additional examples:

1. In 1993-1994, Leland Elementary School had 26% of its students at or above national norms in mathematics. Following implementation of Professor B methodology, Leland had 81% of its students at or above national norms in 1999-2000. This school rose from a ranking below 200th to 5th among elementary schools in the Chicago Public Schools system.

2. In 1998-1999, the third grade at the Sumter Junior High School (K-8), Sumter County, Alabama, averaged at the 28th percentile nationally in mathematics. Following implementation of Professor B methodology, Sumter's third grade averaged at the 74th percentile in 2000-2001. This achievement ranks the third grade in this socially and economically disadvantaged area as the third highest in the state of Alabama.

Everard was commissioned to a UNESCO mission in mathematics education at the request of the governments of St. Lucia, Grenada and Jamaica in 1980. Following the World Conference on Education for All in Jomtien, Thailand during March, 1990, he was invited to present his methodology at the first seminar held by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in its search for "fresh, theoretically grounded methodologies for addressing fundamental educational requirements" (such as those identified at Jomtien). The one and one-half day session on "Innovative Approaches to Meeting Basic Learning Needs" was convened at UNDP Headquarters, New York, in January 1991. Everard was one of four presenters. Participants were educational specialists and program staff from international agencies such as UNDP, UNESCO, the World Bank, UNICEF, Bilateral agencies and institutes. The Director of UNESCO's International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP) attended throughout the duration of the seminar.

The directors of IIEP and UNDP were sufficiently influenced by his presentation to refer him to the Chief of the Regional Bureau for Latin America and the Caribbean, for the purpose of initiating a UNDP-sponsored project in Jamaica, W.I.

The pilot phase of the project was completed during the summer of 1992. After receiving training in Everard's methodology, sixteen mathematics lecturers from local Teachers' Colleges enabled 94% of 265 practicing primary teachers to pass a qualifying examination in mathematics which the vast majority of them had failed repeatedly. The teachers received instruction from the lecturers for five days per week through five weeks. The highest passing rate ever achieved previously (since 1981), by a similar population of primary teachers under the same circumstances, was only 20%. In fact, the highest passing rate ever achieved previously by a population of mixed ability was 60%. By means of similar projects during the summers of 1993 and 1994, the remaining population of practicing teachers unqualified to teach was reduced to an insignificantly small number.

 Copyright © Professor B Enterprises, Inc., 2000