“It Ends in Mass Graves.” Why Mathematics at NMT is a Matter of National Security, Not “Comfort”

Instead of a fixed three, they want to leave only two reinforced concrete subjects for graduates — the Ukrainian language and the history of Ukraine, and give the third to choose from. According to the authors, mathematics should be taken only by those who directly need it for their profile specialty. The logic of the deputies, which was supported by fifty elected representatives from different factions, lies in the plane of psychological comfort and retention of young people in the country: «Ukraine cannot lose children because admission to Ukrainian higher education institutions looks less realistic and less safe for the families of applicants than going abroad.»

However, the IT sector, academics, military personnel, and business community have taken this idea with a grain of salt. For many, it looks not as salvation, but as a capitulation to the intellectual future of a country waging a technological war.

Dev.ua has collected key thoughts from opinion leaders on why the math filter in schools is not about «stress», but about the survival of the state.

Asian Tiger or Californian Populism: Where Are We Going?

Petro Chernyshov, former president of Kyivstar and chairman of the supervisory board of the National Academy of Sciences, is convinced that in trying to simplify life for children, Ukraine is copying the worst and already recognized failures of world experiments. He cites two opposing vectors of development — the tough state strategy of Asia and the humanistic populism of California.

According to the authoritative global educational ranking PISA-2022, the leaders in exact sciences are Singapore, Taiwan, Japan and Korea. Singaporean teenagers are about 5 years ahead of their Western peers in terms of mathematical thinking. Almost 41% of children there are top math experts (compared to 9% in developed countries).

«And it’s not a question of genetics, because this is a tough state strategy. The country invests in brains, not in imaginary psychological comfort (even during war),» Chernyshov notes.

An alternative path was demonstrated in 2014 by the San Francisco County in California, where, for reasons of «equality and humanity,» they abolished full algebra in the eighth grade so that weaker students would not feel worse. The result was disastrous: performance fell across the district, and among vulnerable groups, the level of knowledge slipped from 11% to 4%. Stanford economists stated that the district tried to achieve equality not by raising the floor for the weak, but by lowering the ceiling for everyone. In early 2024, angry parents forced the government to bring algebra back through a referendum.

«We are seriously copying other people’s mistakes in a country that is waging a war for survival. In a country where defense enterprises are already outpacing IT specialists in terms of salaries, but are simply suffocating from personnel starvation, because there is no one to design. We have already successfully buried physics and chemistry. Mathematics is the last frontier that maintains the general level. Making it optional is simply officially signing off that we no longer need our own engineers,» Chernyshov summarizes.

Mathematics is the architecture of AI and the foundation of defense

The president of the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE), Tymofiy Mylovanov, warns that mathematics is the basis of Ukraine’s current economic existence and its future competitiveness. The world is rapidly entering the era of artificial intelligence, where basic education decides what place a person will occupy in the new labor hierarchy.

«We generally exist due to the fact that we have strong mathematicians. That’s why we have IT, that’s why we have defense, that’s why we have defense startups. In the future in this world, those who understand mathematics will understand AI and will build architectures. And everyone else, in fact, will be at most artificial intelligence operators or will replace them altogether. That’s why there’s nowhere without mathematics. And in my opinion, this is a very big mistake,» the economist believes.

This opinion is succinctly but aptly complemented by People’s Deputy and historian Volodymyr Vyatrovych, outlining the balance between the humanitarian and technical pools of knowledge:

«Mathematics teaches you how to build rockets. History teaches you how to set goals.»

Economic suicide and the «broken thermometer»

Educational populism under the guise of «caring for children» leads to large-scale intellectual degradation, believes Dmytro Chumachenko, associate professor of the Department of Mathematical Modeling and AI at the Kharkiv Institute of Mathematics. In his opinion, mathematics in the NMT system is the only nationwide filter that tests the ability to think systematically, analyze data, and build logical connections.

According to the World Bank and OECD, high math scores have the greatest positive impact on a country’s innovation index and per capita income. Trying to eliminate the exam because it’s difficult for teenagers to study during wartime (due to stress and blackouts) is manipulation.

«The solution to this problem should be to adapt methods, increase support for teachers, and create digital tools to make up for educational losses, rather than simply lowering the bar to the plinth. If a patient has a fever, they treat the illness, not break a thermometer. Canceling the exam will not take away stress, but simply legalize ignorance and take away the motivation of teenagers to even open a science textbook in high school,» Chumachenko emphasizes.

He adds that the idea of ​​"compensating» for this with weighting factors during admission demonstrates a misunderstanding of psychology: if a subject is not mandatory for a certificate, most schools and students will simply stop paying attention to it. It will be impossible to catch up on what was lost in the first year — engineering school will die at the secondary education stage, and higher education will turn into a fiction, where diplomas are issued for the mere fact of attendance.

Physics and chemistry have already been lost. Next up is mathematics?

The president of the Kyiv Aviation Institute (KAI), Ksenia Semenova, notes that the Ukrainian defense market is currently experiencing a severe shortage of personnel. There is no one to work with, salaries are growing exponentially, but there are no more engineers due to the unpopularity of technical specialties.

Instead of implementing effective incentives — such as high scholarships, the creation of powerful flagship universities, or simplifying visas for foreign engineering students — the state is taking the path of least resistance.

«If you don’t understand what the abolition of mathematics as a mandatory subject in secondary education will lead to, then look at physics and chemistry. How many people choose these subjects at secondary education, how many then end up entering these specialties. And also how many people in high school are taught physics and chemistry, knowing what secondary education is, they don’t pass. Physics, chemistry and mathematics in school are our defense. Physics and chemistry have already been lost. Well, let’s add mathematics to the same,» Semenova urges.

She ironically says that we are «not stupid Chinese» who force children to learn complex mathematics, we are against unnecessary stress, we have a «special way.» At the same time, the real reason why students go abroad is not the difficulty of exams, but safety and comfort, which is directly proportional to the funding of universities.

Technology War: Lives and Mass Graves at Stake

The most emotional, but from a strictly pragmatic standpoint, reaction to the initiative was given by physicist, volunteer, and military officer Anton Senenko. He is convinced that in the conditions of modern high-tech warfare, fairy tales that «everything can be bought» and that the service sector will save the economy no longer work.

On the front lines, the value of fundamental knowledge is measured every day. A mobilized soldier must not only understand which buttons to press on a $700,000 radar, but also know basic school physics: frequency compatibility, harmonics, and the propagation of electromagnetic waves in space.

«The pace of the war simply doesn’t give us time to fill in the gaps in education, because someone once thought that cosines wouldn’t be needed anywhere. That mathematics at the National Technical University emotionally oppresses the pistils and stamens. It ends in mass graves. And that’s it,» the military man cuts off.

Senenko emphasizes that education in times of existential threat is not a service or just a good, it is a social requirement. Knowledge must be invested in the heads of teenagers despite their resistance or the infantilism of their parents, because an enemy electronic warfare system, drone, or homing head does not care about «pink ponies» and «non-mathematical mindset.»

«A battle of mathematicians, physicists, chemists, and economists has begun. Why government officials stubbornly drag the country into the abyss is a rhetorical question,» Senenko writes, adding that the defense industry is suffocating without personnel: queues for radars stretch for years, and requests from the military remain unsatisfied because there is no one to design and synthesize Ukrainian explosives.

The tip of the iceberg: society lacks constructive dialogue

Amidst the heated discussions, Vadym Denysenko, executive director of the Ukrainian Institute for the Future, notes that this bill will most likely not even reach the meeting room due to the fierce public outcry. However, the problem itself is much deeper than a single exam — the culture of constructive dialogue has been completely lost in Ukraine.

Instead of reforming the education system, analyzing the mistakes of the New Ukrainian School (NUS), and making complex, radical decisions regarding technical specialties, society is being drawn into another «dog fight» on online platforms.

«The discussion about mathematics is long overdue. But it is not about the exam. It is about the education system as a whole. We need radical solutions, especially in the areas of technical specialties. And our discussion about mathematics and NMT is not a discussion at all. Because the discussion needs a moderator (it can be either the ministry or a specialized committee), it needs formalization and, most importantly, it requires conclusions. And no one is going to make them now,» Denysenko states.

Society has become accustomed to living by the principle that «a scandal can always be overturned with another scandal,» raising the bar of destruction higher and higher, instead of transforming the scandal into real and balanced state reforms.

Instead of a conclusion

While politicians are trying to win the favor of graduates and their parents by lowering examination requirements, the expert community is unanimous: simplifying school filters is the way to the third world. A country that aspires to become a European IT hub and a leader in the field of MilitaryTech cannot afford the luxury of abandoning mathematical thinking. After all, in the future world, those societies that can calculate, model, and create their own technologies will survive and win.

MPs want to abolish compulsory mathematics at NMT. ​​We analyze the exam results over 4 years: applicants pass mathematics on average 10–14 points lower than language and history

On the topic

MPs want to abolish compulsory mathematics at NMT. ​​We analyze the exam results over 4 years: applicants pass mathematics on average 10–14 points lower than language and history