Mathematics Conference Aims to Improve Exam Passes

Mathematics teachers will gather at Sam Sharpe Teachers’ College (SSTC) on Wednesday (November 23) to strategise on how to improve passes in the subject among secondary-level students.

Lecturer and Head of the Mathematics Department at the college, Konnor Peters, told JIS News that the ‘Sharp Mathematics 2022’ conference is expected to attract more than 200 teachers from western parishes and St. Ann.

He said that the educators are concerned about the low pass rates in the subject over the past four years.

“We’re not seeing an upward trajectory in terms of the performance at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) examination level,” he noted.

The conference, under the theme ‘Angling our Trajectory to the Future of Mathematics’, will include presentations by a distinguished panel of persons specialising in mathematics education.

In addition to Mr. Peters, these include Acting Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education and Youth, Maureen Dwyer; National Mathematics Coordinator, Dr. Tamika Benjamin; Mathematics Specialist for Region 1 and 2019 Mathematics Teacher of the Year, Karema Mundell-Thomas; and Regional Mathematics Coordinator for St. Ann and Trelawny, Horace Donaldson.

The Head of the SSTC Mathematics Department said that educators will look at, among other things, how culture influences performance in mathematics.

The focus on culture and its correlation to outcomes in mathematics is as a result of the performance of students in the SSTC’s secondary mathematics programme, on which the college has been placing emphasis since 2019.

“We have observed that some persons will come in as students showing a willingness to do the secondary programme but do not stay the course,” Mr. Peters pointed out.

“The reason for [students] not staying is that they lack an attitude of perseverance or [have] a tendency to lose focus in completing the course. There is also the fear of maths and unrealistic expectations that it should be easy when, historically, it hasn’t been. It is a subject that challenges you, and through the challenge you rise to a higher level of thinking and reasoning,” he noted.

Mr. Peters further contended that repeated underperformance in the subject gives rise to the belief that “persons in our country do not seem to understand the nature of mathematics and its relationship to… our current value system, so we consider it prudent to sensitise our people, including our fellow teachers”.

The conference will, therefore, be exploring the history of mathematics, the subcultures and their influences on mathematics, future best practices in the subject, digitisation and mathematics, teaching mathematics in a global environment, transitioning from physical to digital tools, and converting classroom processes into an automated operation.

Mr. Peters said that the three expected outcomes from the conference are improvement in Primary Exit Profile (PEP) and CSEC examination results, creating a learning community of mathematic educators within the western Jamaica region, and in the long-term, building a culture of research.

It is hoped that the conference, which is being held for the first time in western Jamaica, will become a fixture on the College’s calendar of events, Mr. Peters said.