Category Archives: Maths in Media

Rating of mathematics in universities of the world

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  1. University of Cambridge
  2. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
  3. Harvard University
  4. University of California, Berkeley (UCB)
  5. University of Oxford
  6. Princeton University
  7. University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)
  8. Stanford University
  9. (=10) ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology)
  10. (=9) National University of Singapore (NUS)

British universities in the top 50:

1. Cambridge
5. Oxford
12. Imperial
23. Warwick
38. Bristol
46-49: Manchester (shared with Nanyang Technological, Auckland and Queensland)

Labour would reverse Gove’s A-level plan

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From BBC:

Labour will reverse many of the coalition’s changes to A-levels if it wins the next election, shadow schools minister Kevin Brennan has told England’s exam regulator.

In a letter to Ofqual, Mr Brennan said Labour could not support “a policy that undermines both rigour and equity”. [...]

Mr Brennan, writing to the chief exams regulator, Glenys Stacey, said “the weight of opposition” to decoupling the two sets of qualifications [A and AS levels --AB] was “overwhelming

He said the move would narrow students’ A-level choices, remove a key indicator for assessing university applicants and undermine progress in widening access to higher education. [...]

“I understand that the secretary of state’s position on this constitutes a policy direction to you, but in undertaking your work we think that it is important to signal clearly what our position will be following the next general election.

“It is on this basis that I write to you to inform you that a future Labour government in 2015 would not proceed with the decoupling of AS and A-levels.”

The letter says that under Labour AS-levels would continue to be building blocks towards A-levels and students would continue to choose which AS-level subjects they take as full A-levels.

Mr Brennan also raises concerns about other aspects of the government’s plan, including “linear assessment for all subjects at the end of two years of study, the rushed timetable for implementation, and the limited evidence base on which the proposals have been made“.

A Labour spokesman added that further consultation with subject experts was needed before deciding the exact form of assessment for each A-level.

Read the whole article.

 

Children learn to tie shoelaces later than ever before

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One of many cultural shifts undermining the traditional model of mathematics education: loss of dexterity in children. From The Telegraph:

Today’s children may be whiz kids at hi-tech gadgets, but they now learn to tie their shoelaces at a later age than ever before, a new report has found.

Few master the art before the age of six, and some still have difficulty tying their own laces when they are nine or ten years old, it is claimed.

The findings represent a major shift in social habits – just thirty years ago, being able to tie shoelaces was regarded as a skill to be learnt by the age of four, but changes in shoe design and footwear fashions means the skill is no longer essential until much older.

Gary Kibble, retail director for Littlewoods.com who carried out the study, said: “Today’s children now learn how to operate complex technology long before they know how to tie shoe laces. They understand navigation paths and algorithms – yet still don’t know how to make a knot.

Read the whole article.

Barry Cooper: “The Universal Machine” at the New Diorama …

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…. the poignant and hugely entertaining theatre production of “The Universal Machine” at the New Diorama in central London. On April 23 there was a special performance with various various prominent ATY supporters in the audience. It was a great treat to see the nieces of Alan Turing there, familiar to many from their engaging TV interviews, with fascinating memories of their uncle Alan.

The uniformly wonderful company, and Diorama staff, must have been really relieved to hear all the positive comments. The music and cleverly crafted lyrics gave a special lightness to the essentially sad story, and both intensified, and lifted the impact to a new level. Turing’s niece Janet was especially happy to see her grandmother (Turing’s mother Sara) played so brilliantly by Judith Paris. Judith also attracted high praise from The Guardian.

There were lots of reviews in the national press. There was a thoughtful piece by Daisy Bowie-Sell in the Telegraph: http://bit.ly/ZLaiWH with our favourite review by the ever perceptive Libby Purves in The Times: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/arts/stage/theatre/article3751815.ece

If you live within reach of London, don’t miss it! Some nights are already sold out, but it’s on at New Diorama (just 15 minutes walking from Kings Cross) until May 11: http://newdiorama.com/whats-on/the-universal-machine

Alan Turing musical is a surprise success

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From Richard Webb’s review in New Scientist of The Universal Machine at London’s New Diorama Theatre :

 A musical rendition of such a complex and delicate subject matter stands a high chance of going very wrong. It is to the enormous credit of the Pit theatre company that it goes mostly very right. A few unnecessarily jarring comedic interludes aside, this is an engaging, nuanced and ultimately moving piece of theatre.

Read the review.

Cryptography competition goes nationwide in honour of Alan Turing

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From Manchester University Staff Net:

Schools in the Wirral, Devon and Buckinghamshire have provided the winning teams of codebreakers in this year’s Alan Turing Cryptography Competition.

Alan Turing

Launched in 2012 as part of the Alan Turing Centenary, the Cryptography Competition is now an annual event in the School of Mathematics.

The story follows the adventures of Mike and Ellie, fresh from discovering the long-lost ‘Turing Treasure’ in last year’s competition, as they get caught up in a new cryptographic adventure around The University of Manchester, involving a mysterious ancient artefact – the Egyptian Enigma! Students were required to solve six codes to complete the competition.

This year’s winning teams were:

1st place Team ‘G15’ Calday Grange Grammar School, Wirral
2nd place Team ‘Room40’ Torquay Boys’ Grammar School
3rd place Team ‘SmileyFaces:)’ Sir William Borlase’s Grammar School, Marlow

Dr Charles Walkden from the School of Mathematics said: “Once again we – together with SkyScanner, the competition’s sponsor – have been delighted with the amount of excitement and enthusiasm that the competition has generated, with almost 2,000 young cryptographers from all over the UK taking part to solve some fiendishly difficult codes.

“We’ve also had people from Australia, South Africa and North America (as well as several European countries) following the competition, showing that there’s a global interest in the life of Alan Turing and his contributions to society. We’re already planning next year’s competition, starting in January 2014, which promises to be even bigger and better!”

Although the 2013 competition has now closed, you can still view the story and clues at:

Bright pupils ‘falling two years behind peers in Far East’

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An Institute of Education working paper by John Jerrim and Alvaro Choi The mathematics skills of school children: How does England compare to the high performing East Asian jurisdictions? generated a number of responses in the media: The Telegraph (from where the title of this post was borrowed), The Guardian, BBC, The Independent.

A quote from the paper, p. 19:

[A]lthough we maintain that policymakers should focus on the earlier stages of young people’s educational career, some important changes are needed to improve aspects of mathematics provision during secondary school. The most pressing issue is to ensure that the curriculum stretches the best young mathematicians enough, and that they are motivated (and incentivised) to fully develop their already accumulated academic skill. Evidence presented in this paper has suggested that the gap between the highest achieving children in England and the highest achieving children in East Asia widens between ages 10 and 16 (at least in mathematics). This is something that needs to be corrected as highly skilled individuals are likely to be important for the continuing success of certain major British industries (e.g. financial services) and to foster the technological innovation needed for long-run economic growth (Bean and Brown 2005, Toner 2011). One possible explanation for this finding is the widespread use of private tuition by East Asian families for both remedial and enrichment purposes (Ono, 2007; Sohn et al., 2010). This helps to boost the performance of all pupils, including those already performing well at school. In comparison, private tutoring in England is mainly undertaken by a relatively small selection of children from affluent backgrounds, often for remedial purposes. While a large proportion of East Asian families are willing to personally finance such activities through the private sector, the same is unlikely to hold true in the foreseeable future within England. Consequently, the state may need to intervene.

Russel Group’s comment on AS level reform

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From the statement by Dr Wendy Piatt, Director General of the Russell Group:

“Results from AS-levels taken in Year 12 are useful to universities in the admissions process, especially in considering applications for the most competitive courses. [...]

“Whilst we have welcomed the Government’s review of the modular structure of the A-level, we do not believe this need be extended to the complete removal of the AS examination from the A-level.”