TY - JOUR
T1 - The Changing Undergraduate Experience
T2 - A case study of single honours mathematics in England and Wales
AU - Kahn, P. E.
AU - Hoyles, Celia
N1 - Funding Information:
The research was supported by the Society for Research into Higher Education and the Central Research Fund of the University of London. Support was provided by The Royal Society towards attendance at the Eighth International Conference on Mathematics Education. Thanks are due to D. Arrowsmith and G. Woodehouse, and to all who participated in the survey.
PY - 1997
Y1 - 1997
N2 - The shift from an shift to a mass system of higher education can be expected to have led to adjustments in the content of degree programmes. This study points to three main areas of change that have taken place in the content of single honours undergraduate mathematics degrees in England and Wales between 1989 and 1996. The range of mathematics covered has been broadened in favour of 'new' applications of mathematics, a smaller amount of advanced content is now included, and assessment methods place more emphasis on interim examinations. These factors taken together suggest a shift in emphasis away from the rigour and abstraction characteristic of mathematics honours studies. It is argued that further change should increasingly take into account the need to develop students' interests and abilities in ways that allow a greater reconciliation of the tension between the needs of students following broader study and those following more specialised study.
AB - The shift from an shift to a mass system of higher education can be expected to have led to adjustments in the content of degree programmes. This study points to three main areas of change that have taken place in the content of single honours undergraduate mathematics degrees in England and Wales between 1989 and 1996. The range of mathematics covered has been broadened in favour of 'new' applications of mathematics, a smaller amount of advanced content is now included, and assessment methods place more emphasis on interim examinations. These factors taken together suggest a shift in emphasis away from the rigour and abstraction characteristic of mathematics honours studies. It is argued that further change should increasingly take into account the need to develop students' interests and abilities in ways that allow a greater reconciliation of the tension between the needs of students following broader study and those following more specialised study.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0347247617&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/03075079712331380946
DO - 10.1080/03075079712331380946
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:0347247617
SN - 0307-5079
VL - 22
SP - 349
EP - 362
JO - Studies in Higher Education
JF - Studies in Higher Education
IS - 3
ER -