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More than 300 local math teachers were treated to a conference, lunch and heartfelt thanks Saturday, part of a UA effort to increase the number of high-quality math teachers in middle and high schools.

Since it can't raise salaries across the board, the Center of Recruitment and Retention of Mathematics Teachers created the show of appreciation to focus its efforts on making sure every school has such teachers.

Understaffing of math teachers in secondary schools is "the single most important problem with our kids who take math," said Fred Stevenson, a University of Arizona math professor who founded the center five years ago.

This was the center's third Mathematics Educator Appreciation Day and the event has blossomed to include more than 325 area teachers, plus 20 instructors from Pima Community College and 16 professors from the UA.

"It isn't going to raise anybody's salary, but I've found that while competence is vital, teaching is an extremely human endeavor," Stevenson said. "These people need to be appreciated. When they are appreciated, they really get psyched and they get passionate about it."

Jennifer Bultman, a UA graduate and math teacher at Mansfeld Middle School for 3 1/2 years, called the conference reinvigorating and refreshing, saying she appreciated a student-free day to share new ideas with other math teachers. The workshops in particular were helpful in learning more about how to present math in real-life applications, she said.

"It's not just about pen-and-paper problem solving," she said. "It's about showing people that math is everywhere. In a standards-based society, it's hard to make time for the big picture and show how people use math in the real world."

Michael Herzog, a City High School teacher, started with the Teach for Tucson program a year and a half ago after 23 years as an electrical engineer.

"This is such a great way to get everybody together and share ideas," he said. "The challenge is to do stuff with kids that they don't know is math, but they're learning."

Herzog said he took a two-thirds cut in pay to teach and is fortunate to have had that opportunity, but wishes more people could afford to choose teaching over industry jobs.

"We're missing a lot of good talent by not making it a bit more attractive financially," he said. "We get a lot of lip service from government."

Stevenson said the center guides math majors toward tutoring early in their college careers to inspire idealism in young people and get them invested in the idea of teaching. Still, many are attracted to other job offers in industry by the time they graduate.

"Math majors are descended upon because they're darn good," Stevenson said.

The high demand for engineers and scientists in the United States can be a self-perpetuating problem, with shortages driving would-be or could-be teachers into well-paying and waiting industry jobs, leaving fewer math and science teachers to prepare the next generation, he said.

"We need literacy in those fields, and at the same time in order to do that effectively we need teachers who are good, and we don't have enough of them," Stevenson said. "I'd like to see science and math teachers paid a lot more, for schools to be competitive financially so we don't get blown off the field."

On the other end of the spectrum, Stevenson said he's seen veteran teachers with plenty of enthusiasm left driven out of the profession by a school system so focused on standardized testing that it leaves little time in the classroom for anything else.

Stevenson said the debate in Arizona about requiring four years of math in high school is missing the point unless it is accompanied by efforts to pay better and recruit more math teachers.

"I'm against four years of math even though I'm a math educator. Frankly, given the state of math teachers in secondary schools right now, we can't even cover three years of high school," he said.

The appreciation day is starting to pay off, Stevenson said, and he plans to invite Gov. Janet Napolitano and Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne as guests next year.

"It seems as though the community as a whole doesn't understand what we do," said Bob Brummett, a second-year Marana High School algebra teacher who has 144 students every day. "It's not the ease that some people imagine the job to be. I'm always on."

Teachers respond to the congratulations from the UA center, Brummett said.

"Absolutely. There's a support structure at the university that cares about what we do," he said. "They provide us with new opportunities to refine our craft and there's a camaraderie that we get from being all together."

Brummett, retired after decades in hotel management and sales, chose teaching as a second career.

"The majority of students don't like math, but they want to succeed at it and they want more help," he said. "It's not easy and that fact turns some off, but it appeals to others. They like that we care enough to help them succeed."