A Brief IMP History

In 1989, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) published Curriculum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics, which called for major reforms in mathematics education, including

• a shift from a skill-centered to a problem-centered curriculum
• a broadening of the scope of the secondary curriculum to include such areas as statistics, probability, and discrete mathematics
• changes in pedagogical strategies, including emphasis on communication and writing skills
• expansion of the pool of students that receives a "core" mathematical education

The Interactive Mathematics Program (IMP) is a collaboration by mathematicians, teacher-educators, and teachers who have been working together since 1989. Together, we have developed a new four-year high school mathematics curriculum to embody the vision of NCTM's Standards. This curriculum is intended to replace the traditional program of Algebra I, Geometry, Algebra II/Trigonometry, and Precalculus.

The first three years of the IMP curriculum were pilot-tested during 1989-92 at Berkeley High School in Berkeley, CA; Mission High School in San Francisco, CA; and Tracy Joint Union High School in Tracy, CA. The fourth year of the curriculum was pilot-tested during 1993-94 at Berkeley High School; Mission High School; Eaglecrest High School in Aurora, CO; and Silver Creek High School in San Jose, CA.

All of the curriculum has undergone several rounds of review and revision. Throughout both the initial development and the revision, the writers worked directly with teachers and sat with groups of students in IMP classes, discovering what worked and what didn't. The final materials are the result of field testing with hundreds of teachers, thousands of classrooms, and myriad students.

Evaluation and follow-up studies show that IMP students have been admitted to first-rate colleges throughout the country and are doing well. They have scored at least as well on standardized tests as students from traditional programs, and they are also learning topics that students in traditional programs do not see at all. Students have transferred successfully both into and out of the IMP curriculum.