Georgia Northwestern Technical College is launching a new initiative focused on helping students improve their math skills.

Math Matters will target students who are having weaknesses in any one of nine math modules, said GNTC President Craig McDaniel.

“There’s still a real challenge with the student population as a whole with learning math,” McDaniel said. That includes older adults who have gone back to school after they have been laid off from work to students straight out of school who really didn’t get math in school.”

“They come here and still have to learn math,” McDaniel said. “There are a lot of people who do well in reading and English, but when it comes to math they hit a brick wall.”

The initiative, scheduled to officially begin March 9, is aimed at students who are placed in learning support math.

“We graduated about 1,550 students but only 16 or 17 percent had been through learning supported math and graduated,” McDaniel said.

The nine modules that the program will focus on include:

Real numbers

Linear equations and inequalities

Graphing linear equations and inequalities

Systems of linear equations

Exponents and polynomials

Factoring polynomials

Rational expressions and equations

Radical expressions and equations

Quadratic equations

Math labs will be established at all five of GNTC’s campuses, requiring some remodeling, McDaniel said. Software is also expected to be purchased, and GNTC officials are working on a budget.

The college is going through reaccreditation by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges and had to choose a quality enhancement.