Thursday, October 12, 2006

Maths Teacher Shortage

Another article outlining Australia's shortage in qualified maths teachers:

A national study, to be released today, reveals one in five maths teachers did not study maths beyond first year at university and one in 12 did no tertiary maths at all.

Half are teaching subjects other than maths at school and more than a third are aged over 50, raising the problem of an ageing workforce.


Mind you, I ain't going to help but I do wonder if I could be hired part time during my PhD as a "consultant". Additionally, the article points out:

The research highlights the fact almost every Australian student will do maths at some stage during their schooling.

And many fields - such as engineering, agriculture, economics, medicine and business - require a sophisticated understanding of maths and statistics.


My friend studying radiation therapy in Brisbane found that his fellow class mates found a couple of subjects easier since they had done Mathematics C in highschool. However, in QLD some schools teach you Group Theory - a subject that is only used in pure maths majors or higher-level applied maths or physics courses at uni. Victorians were quite surprised when I inform them of this. Then again, Queensland is the Smart State afterall.

2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

funnily enough, i had just finished a conversation about this very article with my colleagues at work, and was going to send you the link, when... of course... i came here to see that you have already passed comment...

i dunno what the problem is really, its apparently the case that everyone who ever studies maths becomes a maths teacher, so how can there possibly be a shortage??

1:38 pm  
Blogger Engels said...

Haha, good point. They must disappear somewhere into the abyss.

4:48 pm  

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