Why do we do math in school?
When I asked this question as a kid, my teachers always told me, “You’ll use it one day.”
That’s almost always false.
Most adults are never going to be in a sticky situation with two binomials, thinking, thank goodness I can FOIL my way out of this mess. Most of us get by just fine without ever solving for x again.
And especially in an AI age, fewer and fewer people will “use math” in the narrow, practical sense.
But the origins of math have never been primarily about utility.
Math is formative. It trains the mind to love what is true, to recognize what is orderly, and to be drawn toward what is beautiful. It teaches us that the universe is not chaos, but something intelligible, something structured, something that can be known.
And you can see that truth made visible in the world’s most breathtaking churches and cathedrals: arches, vaults, domes, proportions, symmetry, harmony, light—geometry turned into glory. The mathematics that shapes a cathedral is not cold or sterile. It’s the language of wonder, carved into stone.
We don’t teach math because everyone will use it.
We teach math because it forms the kind of person who can see that reality has meaning.
I wore a dress for my Cambridge Union debate earlier this year.
The President of the Oxford Union, George Abaraonye, is below, debating Charlie Kirk at the Oxford Union.😱
Now he mocks Charlie’s death.
Teaching children to wear a uniform with pride matters.
Following my meeting on Monday with the Education Secretary @bphillipsonMP my open letter to her is below and here:
https://t.co/O9T19eJaXr
My first open letter to her on 17 Jan is here: https://t.co/phAiybzQFx
Wear your wellies! 🚜
A group of 5th Formers are asking pupils and staff to show their support for UK farming communities by wearing clean wellies to school tomorrow (19th November).
Whether Michaela is first or fifth on Progress is unimportant.
We won’t always have the top place.
But I can tell you this: any school that does, will teach traditionally, have strong discipline and an overall ethos that binds the kids together.
Guaranteed. ✊🏾
"For some reason the Privileges Committee thinks it's in communist China and we must kowtow"
Jacob Rees-Mogg speaks as MPs debate the report that found Boris Johnson lied about partygate in the Commons
https://t.co/PAiZ4D1jU3
📺 Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 and YouTube
Great start to the season for our @SeatonRangersRL u11s who faced @DistingtonARL this morning in the first game of the season.
Some good rugby played from both sides, well done all involved 👏
#iwannabeaseatonranger
BREAKING: Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson has issued a statement following the release of the Privileges Committee's partygate report.
https://t.co/WUnquWvHqf
📺 Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 and YouTube
I’ve had the misfortune of sitting at a bedside day & night in an intensive care unit, praying that my child would survive.
How any nurse could walk away from those units/wards, to go on strike, is simply beyond me. I find it utterly heartbreaking & I will be honest, wrong.
💔
@MichaelBaumber @BBCNews You do realise they dont decide to give themselves a pay rise? Honestly you people comment and you haven't bothered to do any research. 🫣