ORANGE DRINK OR ORANGE JUICE?

Orange juice is a wonderful thing. It’s naturally sweet, high in vitamins and minerals that are good for you, and it tastes great. It takes a great deal of effort to get orange juice to your breakfast table. As a result, orange juice isn’t cheap. There’s the cost of growing oranges, which can only thrive in warm climates, the cost of harvesting the oranges, processing them into juice, pasteurizing and packaging the juice, refrigerating the juice containers during their journey from one state to another, and finally, the cost involved in the sale of the juice to you at the grocery store. Given all of that, it’s surprising that orange juice isn’t much more expensive than it is!

Businesses in the business of selling orange juice have to follow very stringent rules about labeling. If a business sells a carton of orange juice, it has to be 100% orange juice. It cannot be diluted in any way with water or any other liquids. Extra vitamins and minerals can be added during packaging, but those additives must be clearly stated on the container.

Then there’s orange drink, which is not real juice and often contains little, if any nutrients. Orange drink, sometimes called by a variety of names like orange beverage, orange punch, or orange cocktail, often has less than 10% real juice, is often loaded with sugar, and heavily diluted with water.

The laws that regulate labeling protect you as a consumer and ensure that if you spend $3.00 for a small glass of orange juice in a restaurant or $5.00 for a carton of orange juice, you get the juice you want, and not something that only vaguely represents the taste, texture and nutritional value of the original.

Now, let’s relate that story to your education. Math is the most critical subject of all. It builds your mind like exercise builds your body. More than any other subject area, it will prepare you for college, for work, and for life.

But there are no labeling laws on math classes. Your class may be called Algebra I. Your class may be called Integrated Math, Math for Poets, or a lot of other names. How can you be sure that you are getting the content that you need?

How can you be sure that you have learned the math at the level you need to be able to compete with other students who may be working harder than you are? These students will be your competition – in the not so distant future – when you are seeking admissions to colleges or looking for a job. How can you be sure that your math classes are orange juice and not orange drink?

You can use the Math Challenge, that‘s how.

The Math Challenge is a series of online exercises in pre-Algebra, Algebra I, Algebra II, and Geometry. More Challenges may follow. All the Challenges offered will help you ‘benchmark’ your performance against students across your state and across the country. It will help you determine whether you’ve learned enough math, or whether you need to buckle down and study harder.

The Math Challenge will also help your teacher determine what parts of the math content you understand, and what parts of the math content you still need to learn.

The exercises on the Math Challenge have been developed by top-notch mathematics teachers working in some of the best high schools in the country.

You can learn more by checking out our Math Challenge presentations.