Alain Schremmer wrote:The prospect facing students still in need of Basic Algebra as they enter two-year colleges is a discouraging one inasmuch as it usually takes at the very least two semesters before they can arrive at the course(s) that they are interested in—or required to take, not to dwell on the fact that their chances of overall success tend to be extremely low.

Reasonable Basic Algebra (RBA) is a standalone version of part of From Arithmetic To Differential Calculus (A2DC), a course of study developed to allow a significantly higher percentage of students to complete Differential Calculus in three semesters. As it is intended for a one-semester course, though, RBA may serve in a similar manner students with different goals.

The general intention is to get the students to change from being "answer oriented", the inevitable result of "show and tell, drill and test", to being "question oriented" and thus, rather than try to "remember" things, be able to "reconstruct" them as needed.