Counted Out

Counted Out investigates the biggest crises of our time—political polarization, racial and economic inequity, global pandemic and climate change–through an unexpected lens: math.

In our current information economy, math is everywhere. The people we date, the news we see, the influence of our votes, the candidates who win elections, the education we have access to, the jobs we get—all of it is underwritten by an invisible layer of math that few of us understand, or even notice. But whether we know it or not, our numeric literacy—whether we can speak the language of math, and how well—is a critical determinant of social and economic power.

Through a mosaic of personal stories, expert interviews, and scenes of math transformation in action, Counted Out shows what’s at risk if we keep the status quo. Do we want an America in which most of us don’t consider ourselves “math people”? Where math proficiency goes down as students grow up? Or do we want a country where anyone can understand the math that undergirds our society—and can help shape it?

The film is dedicated to Bob Moses, the civil rights leader and MacArthur genius who saw math access as the civil rights issue of our time, and whose work we follow in some of the last filmed interviews of his life.