STEM

Cengage Offers Free College Math Boot Camps

• By Dian Schaffhauser
• 07/21/20

Education technology company Cengage is running free math readiness boot camps for students, to help them prepare for college. The two boot camps, one for college math readiness and the other for calculus, are intended to be provided by the faculty to their incoming students and used by students on their own. Students can also self-enroll. The service is being provided through Cengage's WebAssign division.

Each boot camp includes a formative assessment for students, which takes about an hour-and-a-half to two hours to do. The remaining amount of time needed for the boot camp curriculum will vary depending on how much remediation individual students require.

According to the company, the math readiness program will help students prepare for college algebra, college trigonometry, liberal arts math, quantitative reasoning, precalculus, finite math, college physics and general chemistry. The calculus boot camp addresses applied calculus, calculus I, university physics and engineering.

"For many college students, math is a stumbling block, which impacts retention and college completion. Instructors have long lamented summer learning loss, which is typically more pronounced for math, and likely to be further amplified this fall due to disruptions experienced this spring from COVID-19," said Erin Joyner, senior vice president for higher education products at Cengage. "That, coupled with a higher number of unemployed adult learners heading to college to learn new skills, means there is a real need for math remediation to ensure incoming college students are prepared for success."

Enrollment is available between July 10 and Oct. 15, through the Cengage website.