Thank you all for the speedy and insightful responses. I apologize for any insult I may have inflicted due to some badly thought out wording as Aaron has pointed out I have not taken foundation math and don't really know how difficult it is.
As a side note and in talking about miss-wordings I am wondering if there is a protocol as to when to post a reply and when to edit the original post with additions but for now I will put them here in a reply until I'm told I can put them in the main post.
I find your points very interesting
Aaron and understand completely that some people may be more Hums inclined and that they may find that compulsory math is a contributing factor to them wanting to dropout or simply be less happy with their education but I find this argument quite shallow seeming it quite easily is turned around the other way as a STEM inclined person finds it quite irksome having to attend English on a regular basis too. I personally wont be dropping out due to the compulsory English but it is definitely a contributing factor to my dissatisfaction and I yearn for Thursdays when I have a full day without English and despise Tuesdays when by contrast I have double English. I don't care that those more Hums inclined don't have to do math. I do care that the Education department prioritizes English/Hums and with it communication skills over Math/STEM and with it logic and problem solving skills. Simply put I find it unfair to force one group to do the subject they don't like but allow the other group to not take a subject they equally dislike. For me it isn't about whether they are both compulsory or neither, but prioritizing one or the other will not get you any better adults in the long run and will only increase dissent and discontent in STEM students. Don't get me wrong I understand that making math compulsory will simply get similar responses from the English inclined community but it would be a considerably more fair and just system that judges all students as equals and not as Hums and non-Hums students.
As for the points presented by
pepper77 I find them interesting and certainly worthy of mention but I would ask you since (and I agree with you) writing isn't like learning to ride a bicycle,
Writing isn't like riding a bicycle - you don't learn how to do it once and then remember it for the rest of your life.
I agree it must be practiced
but, and I must emphasis the but, can you not replace every time you say writing with a substitute from most STEM subjects and it would be equally valid? In fact why not say simply 'School isn't like learning to ride a bicycle, you don't learn how to do something once and then remember it for the rest of your life. You must practice it or else you will forget it'. i believe my point here is clear as stated above, math is as important, not more not less, as English.
S200 thank you for the good luck and thank you for the confidence but sadly the exam is not a debate... it is an analytical essay and a textual comparison both on texts which are less than entertaining or enticing for the majority of students I've met (may use that as my IT SAT topic) so though i can identify my opponents arguments a characters motivations more resemble a slippery eel than an arguments firmness. Also the standard persuasive template that I have been taught at all the schools I've been to (and I've bounced around a bit) is: Introduction, 3 TEEL/TEAL paragraphs on mutually exclusive arguments on the same topic followed by a conclusion which wraps all the arguments into one.
miniturtle, I thank you again for your piece of insight and i agree with every point you give but i think you miss the point slightly (potentially my own fault). my argument isn't that English itself is useless but that what they are teaching is. I agree that communication skills are extremely important in any area especially one where you are highly collaborative in a lab or similar setting but equally the skills math teaches are important in every area right back to journalism when you need to figure out which bus will get you to the interview on time you make a mental GANT chart without any of the formality or if you are to cook anything from a recipe then math will allow you to predict whether you will have enough ingredients or whether you could make a half batch instead. I am not here to argue that math is more important though, only equal. currently as the system stands now and has since my grandfathers high-school (I was on the phone to him talking about this topic only a few minutes ago) it prioritizes communication over problem solving.
I would like to end with a note to all the posters. Which will make a boss happier, solving a problem yourself then telling them there was a problem but its fixed or communicating that there is a problem and asking them how to solve the problem? I know which i would prefer as a boss and i know which quality will give that response more often.