THE introduction of life maths in the school curriculum was not well-thought out.
Education Minister Viliame Gavoka also said the preference of students to choose life maths over pure maths may also have caused a decline in iTaukei students taking up STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) subjects.
He said he was part of the two days’ of USP graduation sessions, and it was conspicuous that about 95 per cent of graduates – conferred with undergraduate and post-graduate degrees in areas like information technology, maths, physics, financial management and forensic accounting – did not have many iTaukei.
“I hate to bring this into Parliament,” he said.
“But I am stating something that I believe is unfair. Is this the result of a new life math curriculum that one of you people thought and introduced overnight?
“The introduction of life math may have influenced most iTaukei students to opt for it instead of the pure math, which all of us in this august Parliament learnt in school.”
He said this was quite different to the forefathers who used celestial spheres or coordinates in inter-island travel, and grandmothers who used geometry for weaving maths and metrics when they made salt or pottery.
“Math has been part of our culture, but to have life math as an easy way out had a huge impact on the future of opportunities in terms of scholarships, eligibility criteria for STEM job opportunities from aviation, engineering, maths, science, including financial management.
“It is unforgiveable to create a new subject without much research and global benchmarking, nor contributions from maths experts in our tertiary institutions, and two streams of maths have been shoved down the Curriculum Unit for senior secondary school students.”
He claimed the previous administration was also disallowed from monitoring the implementation of the curriculum at school level.
He said this had led to a disconnect between those developing the curriculum and the implementation of the curriculum by our teachers.
“Teachers have limited training on the teaching curricula which is to deliver the new invented subjects, thus impeding teaching and learning.”
