Mathematics stumps tertiary students

By REBECCA WALSH education reporter

Some students at tertiary level cannot answer maths questions required of a fourth-former.

Research by Manukau Institute of Technology (MIT) maths lecturer Iain Huddleston showed that some students enrolled in MIT courses who had passed sixth-form and seventh-form maths had forgotten or never learned the maths skills they needed for their courses.

For some questions, only 25 per cent of students answered correctly despite having the entry qualifications for their courses - generally sixth-form-level maths.

The study of 280 students was done after lecturers discovered that students were finding the maths component of their courses more difficult than expected.

The students were from a range of courses and included those studying towards degrees in engineering and business studies.

Maths experts the Herald spoke to agreed with many of Mr Huddleston's findings. Although people's knowledge of maths had improved, they said, it was still falling behind the growing needs of the knowledge economy.

Mr Huddleston said he was surprised by the huge gap in students' knowledge.

"In more than half the questions at least 75 per cent of students got them wrong."

Students had difficulty with the decimal system, turning fractions into percentages and understanding statistical differences, for example the difference between mean and median.

He said the problem was partly due to the time between students finishing school and starting tertiary study. Many students returned to study after years of working.

Dr Bill Barton, head of the mathematics education unit at the University of Auckland, was not surprised by the results but believed the maths ability of the population was better than it was 20 years ago.