In a study that consisted of 600 interviews with college-age and older returning students, S.Tobias found three significant variables in her subjects’ inability to do college-level mathematics:

• Fear of mathematics
• Mathematics is a white male domain
• One is either good in mathematics or in language arts but never both.

The students’ lack of coping skills in dealing with mathematics classes and with their own anxieties appeared to be the main barrier to their attempting mathematics one more time.

Two myths about mathematics need to be put to rest:

• College-level mathematics is too difficult for otherwise intelligent students to master.
• Without mathematics, anyone can live a productive intellectual and professional life.

Mathematics is no longer just an entry-level prerequisite for engineering, the physical sciences, and statistics.
Its principles and techniques, along with computers, have become part of almost all areas of work, and its logic is used in thinking about almost everything. This is a big change from the days when a number of professions were virtually math-free.

Today, many occupations that do not require college-level calculus or statistical skills at the outset do demand them later on for anyone aiming toward promotion into management or work in more interesting technical areas.

Mathematical expressions such as “the slope of the curve,” “zero-sum,” “normalized distribution,” and “asymptotic” are no longer heard from unique individuals who lack a sense of fashion.
They have become part of the basic vocabulary of business, politics, library science, health care, and even social work.