ACME Chair writes about mathematics post-16
30 October 2012
Professor Stephen Sparks FRS, Chair of ACME
It is hard to imagine anything more important to a person's
future than his or her education. Despite this, for years we have
been content to ignore the needs of our children by failing to
continue their mathematics education until the point they leave
school. This puts us at odds with almost all other high income
countries, who provide some mathematics for the majority of their
students. It also puts our young people at a significant
disadvantage when it comes to competing in an increasingly global
jobs market.
In England, Wales and Northern Ireland only about 15% of
students continue with post 16 mathematics, mostly by taking A or
AS level. Universities complain about the lack of maths skills in
new students, while employers complain about the lack of numeracy
in many young people seeking employment. This is not a satisfactory
situation for the long-term prospects of the country in a world
where numeracy is becoming increasing important for
competiveness.
Our students also deserve to have enough maths to be able to cope
with daily life, whether it is personal finance or understanding
the statistics and numbers that inform debate in a democracy.
The Advisory Committee on Mathematics Education (ACME) has been
consulting widely for the last several months on how this might be
done and providing advice to the Department for Education. ACME
will be publishing its full report in November. During our work to
date approaches identified include embedding more mathematics in
the curricula of other subjects at A and AS level and in vocational
qualifications, increasing the proportion of students taking A and
AS level mathematics, integrating mathematics into a baccalaureate
style qualification along with other subjects like literacy and
research skills, and producing a new qualification suited to those
students (likely the majority) who do not want to take maths A
levels. These approaches are mutually supportive, and what is
needed now is to combine them into a coherent strategy alongside
other measures.
Of particular importance will be any new course aimed at the large
number of students (about 250,000) who achieve a C grade or above
at GCSE but do not go on to take A level maths. While some of those
may be encouraged into A level courses, the majority of them need
an alternative.
That alternative two year course must provide fluency and
increased confidence in basic mathematics, problem-solving and
mathematics to help understand data and information (notably
statistics). Likely the course will build on knowledge and
achievements at GSCE (or equivalent). Assessment methods will need
to be designed so that maths is not reduced to recipes and
procedures with teaching dominated by teaching to the test
approach.
Above all the course will need to be appealing. Some students
have developed an aversion for maths at an earlier stage in their
education. Any new course will need to attract students who will
see it both as interesting and relevant to their future life and
career aspirations. It will also need to be appealing to those
studying other disciplines who recognise the benefit for their
subject either at A level or in University courses. Finally, it
must meet the needs of employers for a more numerate
workforce.
Significantly increasing participation in post-16 maths has huge
implications for teaching capacity in mathematics. An additional
250,000 pupils a year taking a post-16 maths course implies a very
large national increase in maths teachers and therefore investing
significant resources for teacher training and CPD. Without this
investment, the new courses will not succeed.
Even if new post 16 courses are developed in the way we have
recommended, there would still remain those young people who do not
achieve a C grade at GCSE. We cannot afford to abandon them and
more work is needed to identify options that will allow them to
develop the skills they need for their future.
It is well past time to take action but at last, it seems the
Government and opposition are agreed that action is required. The
Shadow Secretary of State Stephen Twigg has stated his intention
that all students should study mathematics to 18. The Secretary of
State, Michael Gove, has said that he would like the majority of
post-16 students to have some mathematics education within 10
years.
We live in a country where it seems acceptable to be relatively
mathematically illiterate. The mathematical needs of our children
are too important to ignore. They deserve to be adequately prepared
for the workplace and the demands of everyday life. The time to
reform and improve our educational system has finally arrived. We
must grab hold of it.