A B S T R A C T This paper analyses the role of national level reforms in the school curriculum a... more A B S T R A C T This paper analyses the role of national level reforms in the school curriculum and initial teacher education in gender justice in conflict-affected Pakistan, using a multidisciplinary framework applied to multiple data sets from selected teacher education institutions in Sindh. The school curriculum texts analysed potentially perpetuate gender injustice and foster conflict. While teacher education reforms offer the potential for transformative gender justice, gender remains peripheral in initial teacher education curriculum. Furthermore, institutional practices entrench gendered norms. Lecturers' and teachers' limited understanding of their role and capacity for transformative gender justice pose challenges to education for gender justice, social cohesion and conflict mi-tigation. Informed by our understanding of gender as a social construct, multiple strategies within and beyond education are offered towards transformative gender justice.
This paper presents an exploration of the way Pakistani national identity is represented in the e... more This paper presents an exploration of the way Pakistani national identity is represented in the education policy, curriculum and textbooks, revealing that religion, Islam, is used as the chief marker that forms the boundary between Pakistanis and the ‘other’. Imagining Pakistani nation through Islam helps forge unity among diverse ethnic and linguistic groups comprising Pakistan. At the same time this singular national identity serves as an instrument of denial of diversity and internal difference. Furthermore, the overwhelming association of Islamic with Pakistani identity creates tensions and contradictions between the religious and national identity of Pakistanis. The paper starts with a review of current education policy, the grade V curriculum documents and textbooks and then turns to focus on the impact of the curriculum on students’ perceptions of their national identity. The curriculum analysis is organised around two key themes: Religion, Islam, as a key identifier of Pakistani identity and the tensions and contradictions between Muslim nationhood and Pakistani nationhood. The empirical study reported here explores how curriculum texts construct Pakistani identity and the ways in which students understood and described themselves as Pakistani.The data was collected over a period of five months in which four primary state schools in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), two girls’ and two boys’ schools, one each in a rural and an urban setting, were studied intensively. Within each primary school, class V students’ views were captured through single sex focus groups. The research illustrates the ideological power of the curriculum and school experiences in constructing identities, creating belonging and imagining the nation.
This paper explores how undergraduates' mathematics anxiety influences their attitudes towards th... more This paper explores how undergraduates' mathematics anxiety influences their attitudes towards the development of numeracy skills and perceptions of their competence in the latter. The preliminary data presented were obtained using an online survey, which was completed by 174 undergraduates, from four faculties at the University of Central Lancashire, UK. Although respondents were studying a variety of academic subjects, all their degree programmes incorporated some mathematical, numerical and/or statistical elements. Correlation analyses indicated that undergraduates revealing high levels of maths anxiety tended to hold negative attitudes towards the development of numeracy skills. They lacked confidence in and the motivation to develop numeracy skills, and expressed little enjoyment of numeracy. High levels of maths anxiety and negative attitudes towards developing numeracy skills were also linked with low levels of competency in terms of students' self-evaluation of their numeracy skills. Students possessing higher pre-university mathematics qualifications tended to exhibit lower levels of maths anxiety and greater confidence, motivation, enjoyment and competence. Younger students also expressed more confidence and competence. An exploration of the effects of gender revealed that male students exhibited lower levels of maths anxiety and higher levels of confidence, enjoyment, and perceptions of competency in numeracy than female students, even though no significant differences were found between male and female students in terms of their pre-university mathematics (related) qualifications. Students' maths anxiety, confidence, motivation and self-evaluated numerical competence varied with academic discipline (i.e. faculty).
This paper studies an under-researched area – teachers’ role in peacebuilding in conflict-affecte... more This paper studies an under-researched area – teachers’ role in peacebuilding in conflict-affected contexts – through exploring teacher agency for social cohesion in Pakistan. Insights are sought into teachers’ perspectives on the major drivers of conflict in society and the role of education and teachers in social cohesion and mitigating inequities in education. A 4Rs framework of redistribution, recognition, representation and reconciliation was employed to analyse data gathered from: interviews with and classroom observations of teacher educators; focus-group discussions with and a questionnaire completed by pre- and in-service teachers; and analysis of teacher education and school curriculum texts. While teachers expressed a nuanced understanding of the conflict drivers in society and appreciated the significance of education in peacebuilding, they subscribed to assimilationist approaches to social cohesion, which were aligned with curriculum texts and promoted official nation-building agendas. Additionally, teachers saw issues of social cohesion as peripheral to the core academic curriculum. Teachers’ identity was integrally linked to their religious affiliations.
This paper explores teacher governance factors, particularly recruitment and deployment of teache... more This paper explores teacher governance factors, particularly recruitment and deployment of teachers, in relation to inequalities and social cohesion. Pakistan These include a merit and needs-based policy on teacher recruitment to eliminate corruption in recruitment and improve equity on the basis of gender, language, ethnicity, religion, and special needs. A 4Rs framework of redistribution, recognition, representation and reconciliation was employed to analyse data gathered from: interviews with teacher educators, policy makers and development partners, and focus group discussions with and questionnaires completed by pre-and in-service teachers. The study concluded that teacher recruitment was driven by concerns of quality with weakly implemented largely quantitative measures of inclusion. Socio-politically grounded measures would be required for a diverse teaching force. Alongside, policies and procedures for the transfer of teachers would need to be streamlined so that teachers deployed to schools in marginalised areas serve there
This paper explores graduate employers’ and undergraduate students’ perspectives on the significa... more This paper explores graduate employers’ and undergraduate students’ perspectives on the significance of numeracy skills to graduate employability, using two online surveys. Respondents to the employer survey represented a range of business sizes and sectors, while respondents to the undergraduate survey represented a diversity of academic disciplines and were all enrolled at the University of Central Lancashire. One in two employers use numeracy tests in their recruitment procedures for posts, ranging from elementary and skilled trade positions to professional occupations. Although almost two thirds of students recognised the importance of numeracy skills to their employability, about 40% were unaware that employers are increasingly adopting numerical testing, and almost half were anxious about attempting such a test.
This paper explores how undergraduates’ conceptions of mathematics, approaches to learning and th... more This paper explores how undergraduates’ conceptions of mathematics, approaches to learning and their attitudes towards numeracy skills are related. The preliminary dataset was obtained using an online survey completed by 174 self-selecting, volunteer undergraduates from four faculties at a post-1992 UK university. Although the responding undergraduates were studying a variety of academic disciplines, all their degree programmes incorporated some mathematical, numerical and/or statistical elements. A positive association was observed between cohesive conceptions of mathematics and deep approaches to the learning of mathematics and the development of numeracy skills. Students possessing cohesive conceptions also held more positive attitudes towards mathematics. Variations due to gender, age, academic discipline (i.e. faculty in which students were enrolled) and students’ highest pre-university mathematics (or -related) qualifications are discussed.
Until relatively recently, educational research in developing countries has focused mainly on iss... more Until relatively recently, educational research in developing countries has focused mainly on issues of access for addressing gender inequalities in education. This paper argues that challenging patriarchal relations in schooling and education requires moving beyond access to understanding the ways the curriculum acts as a set of discursive practices which position girls and boys unequally and differently constitute them as gendered and nationalised/ist subjects. Using curriculum texts from Pakistan, the paper explores how gender and national identities intersect in a dynamic way in the processes of schooling. The paper illustrates the ideological power of both curriculum and school experiences in fashioning the reciprocal performance and construction of gender and national identities in Pakistan. It contends that in its current form, education is a means of maintaining, reproducing and reinforcing the gender hierarchies that characterise Pakistan.
This paper addresses issues related to the effectiveness of teacher education in Pakistan in the ... more This paper addresses issues related to the effectiveness of teacher education in Pakistan in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), through a small scale collaborative research study in two state secondary schools, one girls' and one boys'. The aim was to explore how newly qualified teachers manage their transition from student teachers to classroom teachers. In teasing out the relationship between teacher training experiences and classroom practice, we highlight the importance of greater consideration of the social and professional contexts of the school within training programmes as a means to make sustained improvements in the quality of classroom teaching and learning.
This paper investigates the relationship between schooling and conflict in Pakistan using an iden... more This paper investigates the relationship between schooling and conflict in Pakistan using an identity-construction lens. Drawing on data from curriculum documents, student responses to classroom activities, and single-sex student focus groups, it explores how students in four state primary schools in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), Pakistan, use curricula and school experiences to make sense of themselves as Pakistani. The findings suggest that the complex nexus of education, religion, and national identity tends to construct 'essentialist' collective identities¿a single identity as a naturalized defining feature of the collective self. To promote national unity across the diverse ethnic groups comprising Pakistan, the national curriculum uses religion (Islam) as the key boundary between the Muslim Pakistani 'self' and the antagonist non-Muslim 'other'. Ironically, this emphasis creates social polarization and the normalization of militaristic and violent identities, with serious implications for social cohesion, tolerance for internal and external diversity, and gender relations.
Purpose – The purpose of this article is to explore the role and importance of numeracy skills in... more Purpose – The purpose of this article is to explore the role and importance of numeracy skills in graduate recruitment within a diversity of employment sectors.
Design/methodology/approach – The results of a mixed-methods study, involving three online surveys (including an employer survey), student focus group sessions and interviews with tutors, are presented.
Findings – The results reveal the importance that employers attach to graduates’ numeracy skills and the extent to which employers use numeracy tests in graduate recruitment. They thus highlight the potential for poor numeracy skills to limit any graduate's acquisition of employment, irrespective of their degree subject; especially since numeracy tests are used predominantly in recruitment to the types of jobs commensurate with graduates’ career aspirations and within sectors that attract graduates from across the diversity of academic disciplines, including the arts and humanities.
Research limitations/implications – Since participants were self-selecting any conclusions and inferences relate to the samples and may or may not be generalisable to wider target populations.
Practical implications – The paper highlights what actions are necessary to enhance undergraduates’ numeracy skills in the context of graduate employability.
Social implications – The vulnerability of particular groups of students (e.g. females, those not provided with any opportunities to practise or further develop their numeracy skills whilst in higher education, those with no (or low) pre-university mathematics qualifications, and mature students) is highlighted.
Originality/value – The article is timely in view of national policy to extend the graduate employability performance indicators within quality assurance measures for UK higher education
This empirical study explores factors influencing undergraduates’ self-evaluation of their numeri... more This empirical study explores factors influencing undergraduates’ self-evaluation of their numerical competence, using data from an online survey completed by 566 undergraduates from a diversity of academic disciplines, across all four faculties at a post-1992 UK university. Analysis of the data, which included correlation and multiple regression analyses, revealed that undergraduates exhibiting greater confidence in their mathematical and numeracy skills, as evidenced by their higher self-evaluation scores and their higher scores on the confidence sub-scale contributing to the measurement of attitude, possess more cohesive, rather than fragmented, conceptions of mathematics, and display more positive attitudes towards mathematics/numeracy. They also exhibit lower levels of mathematics anxiety. Students exhibiting greater confidence also tended to be those who were relatively young (i.e. 18–29 years), whose degree programmes provided them with opportunities to practise and further develop their numeracy skills, and who possessed higher pre-university mathematics qualifications. The multiple regression analysis revealed two positive predictors (overall attitude towards mathematics/numeracy and possession of a higher pre-university mathematics qualification) and five negative predictors (mathematics anxiety, lack of opportunity to practise/develop numeracy skills, being a more mature student, being enrolled in Health and Social Care compared with Science and Technology, and possessing no formal mathematics/numeracy qualification compared with a General Certificate of Secondary Education or equivalent qualification) accounted for approximately 64% of the variation in students’ perceptions of their numerical competence. Although the results initially suggested that male students were significantly more confident than females, one compounding variable was almost certainly the students’ highest pre-university mathematics or numeracy qualification, since a higher percentage of males (24%) compared to females (15%) possessed an Advanced Subsidiary or A2 qualification (or equivalent) in mathematics. Of particular concern is the fact that undergraduates based in Health and Social Care expressed significantly less confidence in their numeracy skills than students from any of the other three faculties.
A B S T R A C T This paper analyses the role of national level reforms in the school curriculum a... more A B S T R A C T This paper analyses the role of national level reforms in the school curriculum and initial teacher education in gender justice in conflict-affected Pakistan, using a multidisciplinary framework applied to multiple data sets from selected teacher education institutions in Sindh. The school curriculum texts analysed potentially perpetuate gender injustice and foster conflict. While teacher education reforms offer the potential for transformative gender justice, gender remains peripheral in initial teacher education curriculum. Furthermore, institutional practices entrench gendered norms. Lecturers' and teachers' limited understanding of their role and capacity for transformative gender justice pose challenges to education for gender justice, social cohesion and conflict mi-tigation. Informed by our understanding of gender as a social construct, multiple strategies within and beyond education are offered towards transformative gender justice.
This paper presents an exploration of the way Pakistani national identity is represented in the e... more This paper presents an exploration of the way Pakistani national identity is represented in the education policy, curriculum and textbooks, revealing that religion, Islam, is used as the chief marker that forms the boundary between Pakistanis and the ‘other’. Imagining Pakistani nation through Islam helps forge unity among diverse ethnic and linguistic groups comprising Pakistan. At the same time this singular national identity serves as an instrument of denial of diversity and internal difference. Furthermore, the overwhelming association of Islamic with Pakistani identity creates tensions and contradictions between the religious and national identity of Pakistanis. The paper starts with a review of current education policy, the grade V curriculum documents and textbooks and then turns to focus on the impact of the curriculum on students’ perceptions of their national identity. The curriculum analysis is organised around two key themes: Religion, Islam, as a key identifier of Pakistani identity and the tensions and contradictions between Muslim nationhood and Pakistani nationhood. The empirical study reported here explores how curriculum texts construct Pakistani identity and the ways in which students understood and described themselves as Pakistani.The data was collected over a period of five months in which four primary state schools in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), two girls’ and two boys’ schools, one each in a rural and an urban setting, were studied intensively. Within each primary school, class V students’ views were captured through single sex focus groups. The research illustrates the ideological power of the curriculum and school experiences in constructing identities, creating belonging and imagining the nation.
This paper explores how undergraduates' mathematics anxiety influences their attitudes towards th... more This paper explores how undergraduates' mathematics anxiety influences their attitudes towards the development of numeracy skills and perceptions of their competence in the latter. The preliminary data presented were obtained using an online survey, which was completed by 174 undergraduates, from four faculties at the University of Central Lancashire, UK. Although respondents were studying a variety of academic subjects, all their degree programmes incorporated some mathematical, numerical and/or statistical elements. Correlation analyses indicated that undergraduates revealing high levels of maths anxiety tended to hold negative attitudes towards the development of numeracy skills. They lacked confidence in and the motivation to develop numeracy skills, and expressed little enjoyment of numeracy. High levels of maths anxiety and negative attitudes towards developing numeracy skills were also linked with low levels of competency in terms of students' self-evaluation of their numeracy skills. Students possessing higher pre-university mathematics qualifications tended to exhibit lower levels of maths anxiety and greater confidence, motivation, enjoyment and competence. Younger students also expressed more confidence and competence. An exploration of the effects of gender revealed that male students exhibited lower levels of maths anxiety and higher levels of confidence, enjoyment, and perceptions of competency in numeracy than female students, even though no significant differences were found between male and female students in terms of their pre-university mathematics (related) qualifications. Students' maths anxiety, confidence, motivation and self-evaluated numerical competence varied with academic discipline (i.e. faculty).
This paper studies an under-researched area – teachers’ role in peacebuilding in conflict-affecte... more This paper studies an under-researched area – teachers’ role in peacebuilding in conflict-affected contexts – through exploring teacher agency for social cohesion in Pakistan. Insights are sought into teachers’ perspectives on the major drivers of conflict in society and the role of education and teachers in social cohesion and mitigating inequities in education. A 4Rs framework of redistribution, recognition, representation and reconciliation was employed to analyse data gathered from: interviews with and classroom observations of teacher educators; focus-group discussions with and a questionnaire completed by pre- and in-service teachers; and analysis of teacher education and school curriculum texts. While teachers expressed a nuanced understanding of the conflict drivers in society and appreciated the significance of education in peacebuilding, they subscribed to assimilationist approaches to social cohesion, which were aligned with curriculum texts and promoted official nation-building agendas. Additionally, teachers saw issues of social cohesion as peripheral to the core academic curriculum. Teachers’ identity was integrally linked to their religious affiliations.
This paper explores teacher governance factors, particularly recruitment and deployment of teache... more This paper explores teacher governance factors, particularly recruitment and deployment of teachers, in relation to inequalities and social cohesion. Pakistan These include a merit and needs-based policy on teacher recruitment to eliminate corruption in recruitment and improve equity on the basis of gender, language, ethnicity, religion, and special needs. A 4Rs framework of redistribution, recognition, representation and reconciliation was employed to analyse data gathered from: interviews with teacher educators, policy makers and development partners, and focus group discussions with and questionnaires completed by pre-and in-service teachers. The study concluded that teacher recruitment was driven by concerns of quality with weakly implemented largely quantitative measures of inclusion. Socio-politically grounded measures would be required for a diverse teaching force. Alongside, policies and procedures for the transfer of teachers would need to be streamlined so that teachers deployed to schools in marginalised areas serve there
This paper explores graduate employers’ and undergraduate students’ perspectives on the significa... more This paper explores graduate employers’ and undergraduate students’ perspectives on the significance of numeracy skills to graduate employability, using two online surveys. Respondents to the employer survey represented a range of business sizes and sectors, while respondents to the undergraduate survey represented a diversity of academic disciplines and were all enrolled at the University of Central Lancashire. One in two employers use numeracy tests in their recruitment procedures for posts, ranging from elementary and skilled trade positions to professional occupations. Although almost two thirds of students recognised the importance of numeracy skills to their employability, about 40% were unaware that employers are increasingly adopting numerical testing, and almost half were anxious about attempting such a test.
This paper explores how undergraduates’ conceptions of mathematics, approaches to learning and th... more This paper explores how undergraduates’ conceptions of mathematics, approaches to learning and their attitudes towards numeracy skills are related. The preliminary dataset was obtained using an online survey completed by 174 self-selecting, volunteer undergraduates from four faculties at a post-1992 UK university. Although the responding undergraduates were studying a variety of academic disciplines, all their degree programmes incorporated some mathematical, numerical and/or statistical elements. A positive association was observed between cohesive conceptions of mathematics and deep approaches to the learning of mathematics and the development of numeracy skills. Students possessing cohesive conceptions also held more positive attitudes towards mathematics. Variations due to gender, age, academic discipline (i.e. faculty in which students were enrolled) and students’ highest pre-university mathematics (or -related) qualifications are discussed.
Until relatively recently, educational research in developing countries has focused mainly on iss... more Until relatively recently, educational research in developing countries has focused mainly on issues of access for addressing gender inequalities in education. This paper argues that challenging patriarchal relations in schooling and education requires moving beyond access to understanding the ways the curriculum acts as a set of discursive practices which position girls and boys unequally and differently constitute them as gendered and nationalised/ist subjects. Using curriculum texts from Pakistan, the paper explores how gender and national identities intersect in a dynamic way in the processes of schooling. The paper illustrates the ideological power of both curriculum and school experiences in fashioning the reciprocal performance and construction of gender and national identities in Pakistan. It contends that in its current form, education is a means of maintaining, reproducing and reinforcing the gender hierarchies that characterise Pakistan.
This paper addresses issues related to the effectiveness of teacher education in Pakistan in the ... more This paper addresses issues related to the effectiveness of teacher education in Pakistan in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), through a small scale collaborative research study in two state secondary schools, one girls' and one boys'. The aim was to explore how newly qualified teachers manage their transition from student teachers to classroom teachers. In teasing out the relationship between teacher training experiences and classroom practice, we highlight the importance of greater consideration of the social and professional contexts of the school within training programmes as a means to make sustained improvements in the quality of classroom teaching and learning.
This paper investigates the relationship between schooling and conflict in Pakistan using an iden... more This paper investigates the relationship between schooling and conflict in Pakistan using an identity-construction lens. Drawing on data from curriculum documents, student responses to classroom activities, and single-sex student focus groups, it explores how students in four state primary schools in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), Pakistan, use curricula and school experiences to make sense of themselves as Pakistani. The findings suggest that the complex nexus of education, religion, and national identity tends to construct 'essentialist' collective identities¿a single identity as a naturalized defining feature of the collective self. To promote national unity across the diverse ethnic groups comprising Pakistan, the national curriculum uses religion (Islam) as the key boundary between the Muslim Pakistani 'self' and the antagonist non-Muslim 'other'. Ironically, this emphasis creates social polarization and the normalization of militaristic and violent identities, with serious implications for social cohesion, tolerance for internal and external diversity, and gender relations.
Purpose – The purpose of this article is to explore the role and importance of numeracy skills in... more Purpose – The purpose of this article is to explore the role and importance of numeracy skills in graduate recruitment within a diversity of employment sectors.
Design/methodology/approach – The results of a mixed-methods study, involving three online surveys (including an employer survey), student focus group sessions and interviews with tutors, are presented.
Findings – The results reveal the importance that employers attach to graduates’ numeracy skills and the extent to which employers use numeracy tests in graduate recruitment. They thus highlight the potential for poor numeracy skills to limit any graduate's acquisition of employment, irrespective of their degree subject; especially since numeracy tests are used predominantly in recruitment to the types of jobs commensurate with graduates’ career aspirations and within sectors that attract graduates from across the diversity of academic disciplines, including the arts and humanities.
Research limitations/implications – Since participants were self-selecting any conclusions and inferences relate to the samples and may or may not be generalisable to wider target populations.
Practical implications – The paper highlights what actions are necessary to enhance undergraduates’ numeracy skills in the context of graduate employability.
Social implications – The vulnerability of particular groups of students (e.g. females, those not provided with any opportunities to practise or further develop their numeracy skills whilst in higher education, those with no (or low) pre-university mathematics qualifications, and mature students) is highlighted.
Originality/value – The article is timely in view of national policy to extend the graduate employability performance indicators within quality assurance measures for UK higher education
This empirical study explores factors influencing undergraduates’ self-evaluation of their numeri... more This empirical study explores factors influencing undergraduates’ self-evaluation of their numerical competence, using data from an online survey completed by 566 undergraduates from a diversity of academic disciplines, across all four faculties at a post-1992 UK university. Analysis of the data, which included correlation and multiple regression analyses, revealed that undergraduates exhibiting greater confidence in their mathematical and numeracy skills, as evidenced by their higher self-evaluation scores and their higher scores on the confidence sub-scale contributing to the measurement of attitude, possess more cohesive, rather than fragmented, conceptions of mathematics, and display more positive attitudes towards mathematics/numeracy. They also exhibit lower levels of mathematics anxiety. Students exhibiting greater confidence also tended to be those who were relatively young (i.e. 18–29 years), whose degree programmes provided them with opportunities to practise and further develop their numeracy skills, and who possessed higher pre-university mathematics qualifications. The multiple regression analysis revealed two positive predictors (overall attitude towards mathematics/numeracy and possession of a higher pre-university mathematics qualification) and five negative predictors (mathematics anxiety, lack of opportunity to practise/develop numeracy skills, being a more mature student, being enrolled in Health and Social Care compared with Science and Technology, and possessing no formal mathematics/numeracy qualification compared with a General Certificate of Secondary Education or equivalent qualification) accounted for approximately 64% of the variation in students’ perceptions of their numerical competence. Although the results initially suggested that male students were significantly more confident than females, one compounding variable was almost certainly the students’ highest pre-university mathematics or numeracy qualification, since a higher percentage of males (24%) compared to females (15%) possessed an Advanced Subsidiary or A2 qualification (or equivalent) in mathematics. Of particular concern is the fact that undergraduates based in Health and Social Care expressed significantly less confidence in their numeracy skills than students from any of the other three faculties.
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Papers by Naureen Durrani
attitudes towards numeracy skills are related. The preliminary dataset was obtained using an online survey
completed by 174 self-selecting, volunteer undergraduates from four faculties at a post-1992 UK university.
Although the responding undergraduates were studying a variety of academic disciplines, all their degree
programmes incorporated some mathematical, numerical and/or statistical elements. A positive association
was observed between cohesive conceptions of mathematics and deep approaches to the learning of
mathematics and the development of numeracy skills. Students possessing cohesive conceptions also held
more positive attitudes towards mathematics. Variations due to gender, age, academic discipline (i.e. faculty
in which students were enrolled) and students’ highest pre-university mathematics (or -related) qualifications
are discussed.
Design/methodology/approach – The results of a mixed-methods study, involving three online surveys (including an employer survey), student focus group sessions and interviews with tutors, are presented.
Findings – The results reveal the importance that employers attach to graduates’ numeracy skills and the extent to which employers use numeracy tests in graduate recruitment. They thus highlight the potential for poor numeracy skills to limit any graduate's acquisition of employment, irrespective of their degree subject; especially since numeracy tests are used predominantly in recruitment to the types of jobs commensurate with graduates’ career aspirations and within sectors that attract graduates from across the diversity of academic disciplines, including the arts and humanities.
Research limitations/implications – Since participants were self-selecting any conclusions and inferences relate to the samples and may or may not be generalisable to wider target populations.
Practical implications – The paper highlights what actions are necessary to enhance undergraduates’ numeracy skills in the context of graduate employability.
Social implications – The vulnerability of particular groups of students (e.g. females, those not provided with any opportunities to practise or further develop their numeracy skills whilst in higher education, those with no (or low) pre-university mathematics qualifications, and mature students) is highlighted.
Originality/value – The article is timely in view of national policy to extend the graduate employability performance indicators within quality assurance measures for UK higher education
attitudes towards numeracy skills are related. The preliminary dataset was obtained using an online survey
completed by 174 self-selecting, volunteer undergraduates from four faculties at a post-1992 UK university.
Although the responding undergraduates were studying a variety of academic disciplines, all their degree
programmes incorporated some mathematical, numerical and/or statistical elements. A positive association
was observed between cohesive conceptions of mathematics and deep approaches to the learning of
mathematics and the development of numeracy skills. Students possessing cohesive conceptions also held
more positive attitudes towards mathematics. Variations due to gender, age, academic discipline (i.e. faculty
in which students were enrolled) and students’ highest pre-university mathematics (or -related) qualifications
are discussed.
Design/methodology/approach – The results of a mixed-methods study, involving three online surveys (including an employer survey), student focus group sessions and interviews with tutors, are presented.
Findings – The results reveal the importance that employers attach to graduates’ numeracy skills and the extent to which employers use numeracy tests in graduate recruitment. They thus highlight the potential for poor numeracy skills to limit any graduate's acquisition of employment, irrespective of their degree subject; especially since numeracy tests are used predominantly in recruitment to the types of jobs commensurate with graduates’ career aspirations and within sectors that attract graduates from across the diversity of academic disciplines, including the arts and humanities.
Research limitations/implications – Since participants were self-selecting any conclusions and inferences relate to the samples and may or may not be generalisable to wider target populations.
Practical implications – The paper highlights what actions are necessary to enhance undergraduates’ numeracy skills in the context of graduate employability.
Social implications – The vulnerability of particular groups of students (e.g. females, those not provided with any opportunities to practise or further develop their numeracy skills whilst in higher education, those with no (or low) pre-university mathematics qualifications, and mature students) is highlighted.
Originality/value – The article is timely in view of national policy to extend the graduate employability performance indicators within quality assurance measures for UK higher education