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In this article, we examine how southern white Christian secondary mathematics teacher candidates reflected on racial inequities in academic opportunities and school discipline after engaging with data sets highlighting such disparities. Using a lens of racial noticing, informed by Leonardo’s (2009) conceptualization of whiteness as a racial discourse that normalizes white dominance, we analyze candidates’ written reflections to identify how they interpreted and responded to issues of race in mathematics education. Two dominant themes emerged: the normalization of implicit biases and the tensions between aspiring to objectivity and acknowledging subjectivity in educational practices. Both patterns aligned with whiteness by obscuring systemic inequities. Notably, while many candidates avoided overt deficit views of students of color, their reflections often framed inequities as personal or inevitable rather than structural. We conjecture that their Christian commitments reinforced color-evasive framings while also discouraging overtly deficit interpretations. Statistical investigations, however, created openings for naming race and bias, suggesting both the potential and the limits of such approaches. Findings underscore the need for teacher education to explicitly confront whiteness, with data investigations that highlight racial disparities as being a promising avenue to develop racial literacy and promote systemic change. 

Racism impacts the lives of students who identify as Black, Indigenous, or People of Color (BIPOC) in a myriad of ways. It is important that future teachers go beyond individual acts of racism to understand how racism operates as a system. To this end, we designed and implemented a statistical investigation with 13 preservice teachers using real traffic stop data from a local city. We were interested in how preservice teachers explained the role of racism in the policing of traffic stops. Drawing on a framing of systemic racism as an intertwining of individual, cultural, and institutional factors, we found that most of the preservice teachers made connections between the results of their statistical investigations and broader institutional factors that affect policing. Statistical investigations using large datasets that highlight disparities based on race provide affordances for preservice teachers to start thinking about systemic racism. Further, the investigations can normalize challenging conversations around race and racism in mathematics and statistics content courses. 

This report is part of a larger, longitudinal study focusing on the development of equity-related knowledge, beliefs, and practice across 68 individuals and five teacher preparation programs. In this brief report, we seek to unpack the ways five preservice and beginning mathematics teachers think about equity, especially as it relates to their current and future teacher practice. Analysis of interview data from these participants suggest as many as twelve different aspects of equity reflected in their thinking, as well as multiple actions teachers could take to promote equity including raising expectations, rejecting deficit views, and using complex instruction. 

This paper reports on how 10 middle and high school preservice teachers (PSTs) designed a social justice focused lesson using the culturally responsive mathematics teaching (CRMT) tool. Results from our analysis indicate that most of the PSTs were able to select appropriate social justice topics, though not all the PSTs integrated mathematics and social justice throughout their lessons. The results show that most of the PSTs need more experience with mathematization, handling controversial discussions, and developing transformative student action. Our work also led to a modification of the tool (CRMT-M). We discuss the implications of the study for mathematics teacher preparation.