Enrolment, achievement and retention on ‘traditional’ and ‘Use of Mathematics’ pre-university courses

Abstract

This paper investigates enrolment, attainment and drop-out rates for two different English pre-university advanced mathematics, AS-level, courses, a ‘traditional’ and an innovative ‘Use of Mathematics’ pre-university course. Very different student profiles were found for those enrolled on each course, and a model of attainment at the pre-university level showed a relatively complex relationship with prior achievement at the end of compulsory schooling. Although those pupils who had relatively high prior achievement tended also to achieve relatively highly on the pre-university courses, this relationship was not evident for lower scores. Those pupils with ‘mid-range’ prior attainment tended to make the smallest gains. Taking prior attainment into account, the difference in attainment outcomes between the two courses is small. However, these courses do differ with respect to the number of students retained, with the ‘Use of Mathematics’ course retaining a significantly higher proportion of the students. Contextual factors are discussed, suggesting implications for policy and practice in mathematics education.

Keywords:

• mathematics programmes
• enrolment
• drop-out
• GCSE
• AS-level

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the support of the ESRC-TLRP9 programme of research into widening participation (RES-139-25-0241).

Notes

1. The examinations referred to in this paper are those offered to students in England, Northern Ireland and Wales:GCSE: General Certificate of Secondary Education. GCSEs are normally taken at the end of compulsory education in England at age 16 in a range of subjects, including mathematics. At the time of the research, the GCSE could be taken at intermediate and higher levels. The higher level course consisted of an extensive syllabus, including algebra, and was thought to be more appropriate for preparing student for A-level courses. The intermediate level course consisted of a more restricted syllabus not specifically designed for progression onto the A-level.AS: Advanced Subsidiary Level General Certificate of Education. The AS qualification is normally taken in post-compulsory education. It is typically taken at the end of one year of study, as a first stage in getting to the A-levels (A2) at the end of the Sixth Form.A2: Advanced Level General Certificate of Education: This qualification is almost universally referred to as an A-level in England, and is typically taken at the end of two years of study.

2. As there were very few A* GCSE-grades in the UoM sample, all A* grades were omitted from the model, leaving grades A to Intermediate-C.

3.

4. Although effect displays are often used to identify high-order terms in generalised linear models, they are used here to provide a simple graphical illustration of the main model effects (Fox 1987, 2003).

5.

6. Mean values were used, as these statistics provide a simple comparison between the groups. In order to compute means, GCSE-grades were coded as continuous, using equi-distance codes of 1 to 6, representing GCSE-grades of intermediate-C to A*.

7. For clarity, only AS-grades and GCSE-grades are shown for each of the courses.

8.

9. The Educational and Social Economic Research Council (ESRC) is the UK's social research council that funds academic research in the social sciences, including Education. The ESRC, using university sponsorship, funded the Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP) to conduct educational research in teaching and learning for over ten years in multiple phases, including one on Widening Participation in 2005–2008. See www.tlrp.org