One perennial cliché of Britain’s political and chattering classes is that we have an “anti-maths mindset”, as a former prime minister put it.
It’s the idea that people can be oddly proud to be bad at maths.
Every time I visit a school, it becomes clear how out of date this cliché really is. In fact, we have a generation of pro-maths children and young adults.
Many of England’s 15-year-olds have positive attitudes towards and proficiency in the subject, according to the OECD. England does well by international comparisons of mathematical capability.
We now have more than 100,000 entries for A level maths each year – the most popular post-16 subject.
But this progress masks a fundamental problem for mathematics education: about one-third of GCSE students are not achieving a grade 4, regarded by government as a standard pass.
Teachers around the country will recognise the cycle of resits, misery and sense of ‘failure’ that these students enter into after their GCSEs.
They will also recognise the disruption it causes to schools and colleges as resit day brings regular learning to a halt. All of this for a pass rate in resits of just 17 per cent.
Every resit student will have knowledge gaps in different areas of this vast curriculum. Yet teachers are expected to prepare them all for another attempt at passing in November – just two months after returning to school.
This needs urgent attention and reform. We have to rethink maths education so that it helps both high-achievers and those who struggle to fulfil their potential.
The government’s recent blunt solution has been to simply drop the maths requirement for apprentices aged 19 or over. It’s an understandable response, but we can do better. We must, if we’re serious about growth.
Short course GCSE
At OCR we are proposing a new short course GCSE in maths to be taken by all pupils at the end of year 10, on the way to the full course at year 11.
The short course would be more focused on the fundamental maths skills (like number and data-handling) that everyone needs for work and life.
A good pass in the short course would be sufficient for many careers and most further study. But every student would also have the chance to progress to a more stretching full course in GCSE mathematics and beyond.
With focused reform, we can further challenge the high achievers without leaving behind those who are currently being let down.
Less exam time
We can do this without increasing the number of exams. In fact, our proposals would reduce the total time spent in exam halls for GCSE maths.
Our research has found that only two of the three exams currently taken for the subject are needed to predict a student’s final grade.
We are calling for the 4.5 hour minimum examination time for the subject to be changed.
A leaner curriculum
The advantage of these proposals is that they protect the advances we’ve made with high performers by maintaining the rigour of the maths GCSE, while also providing a more focused approach to the fundamentals for those who don’t need advanced knowledge.
After all, if we are telling young people that they must have a qualification to get a good job or continue their studies, they are entitled to ask why it should include advanced concepts that they will never need for non-STEM work and life.
To really make this work, we need a broader package of reforms. As well as reducing exam time, we also want to see some less relevant areas of the curriculum removed, giving more time for deeper understanding rather than superficial knowledge.
Crucially, we need to see improvements at key stage 3, currently a missed opportunity to identify and embed the basics that many students are leaving education without.
There is currently no consistent benchmarking of ability when students begin key stage 4. We need to fix this so that schools know where students’ knowledge gaps are before it is too late.
These proposals have been shaped by a great deal of review and research, and extensively listening to the views of teachers and students. This consultation and discussion will continue with teachers and subject experts at their heart.
We need young people able to apply their mathematics skills in a financially literate way, to comprehend basic science, to protect themselves from disinformation, and to seize the opportunities of novel technologies.
If one-third of them are leaving school without this, it is not their failure; it is all of ours.
