The RSS is delighted to be involved in an ambitious new research project seeking to shape and strengthen the mathematics and statistics curricula of the future to meet the rising need for data skills in the workplace.
The two-year project, The Mathematics Curricula Futures, is a partnership between the Royal Society, the RSS, the London Mathematical Society and the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications. Tech company Arm, is the first partner to support the research phase of this project.
It is being led by RSS fellow Professor Frank Kelly (pictured), who chairs the Royal Society’s Advisory Committee on Mathematics Education (ACME). ‘We need to ensure our education system provides all young people across all stages of education with mathematical knowledge and skills,' he explains. 'This will require curriculum and qualifications change over the next ten years.’
Sharon Witherspoon, RSS vice president for education and statistical literacy, adds: ‘This project is a partnership that has an ambitious goal – the transformation of number and data skills, including statistical skills, at all stages of schooling. It seeks to use technology and harness interest in data skills based on evidence about what works. If we are to achieve the aspirations set out in Data Manifesto, we need to take an integrated look at how we can achieve the long-term changes that are needed in our education for number and data skills.’
The project will aim to help children and young people get excited about mathematics and provide them with creative, mathematical, quantitative thinking and data skills, crucial to securing their success in the world of work. It will also equip teachers to teach young people the skills required to help solve tomorrow’s challenges, provide innovative approaches to improve outcomes in maths across education stages and help inspire more young people to take up careers requiring maths in the future.