Comment: While astronaut Eileen Collins was seeking this week to inspire every youngster in the State to realise how competence in maths could - literally - take them to the stars, a difficult higher level Leaving Certificate maths paper generated cries of "foul" from students, parents and teachers alike, writes John McGowan.
The study of maths, and the need to increase the number of students taking the subject at higher level in our secondary schools, is too important an issue to be left languishing somewhere between these emotional extremes.
Competency in maths is critical when it comes to designing structures and systems, to analysing problems and generating solutions. The whole world of engineering is based on maths, which is the universal language of analysis, and an invaluable skill to possess.
Aside from the anguish of students who were disappointed by this week's paper, perhaps more damaging is the extensive reporting of the anger which it generated. How many transition year students, for instance, were this week re-assessing their previous intentions to take higher level maths when they move into fifth-year this September?
There is no doubt that this week's rumpus sends out all the wrong signals. We know that many students play the system to get the highest number of points regardless of their interest in particular subjects. Sitting the higher level maths Leaving Cert paper is perceived by many students as time-consuming and risky.
With hard work and practice, they could score well, but why take the risk when they could spend more time on what they consider to be easier subjects and maximise their points potential?
This is why Engineers Ireland supports the Royal Irish Academy and Ibec in their call for bonus points to be awarded for higher-level maths. Third level engineering academics have expressed concern at the standard of maths capability of undergraduate students. This suggests that any revisions to the Leaving Cert maths curriculum should ensure that students are better equipped with the principles of mathematics.
If we want to sustain Ireland's economic growth, we need more students to take higher level maths, physics and chemistry. Armed with the fundamentals of maths and the physical sciences, Leaving Cert students can then have the choice of studying engineering, information technology or science at third level.
Without an increase in the throughput of graduates from these courses Ireland will struggle, if not fail, to build on the economic success of the past decade, as the global economy becomes more knowledge based.
In a report called Engineering a Knowledge Island 2020 published last October by Engineers Ireland and the Irish of Academy of Engineering, we framed a vision of how Ireland could become a leading, knowledge-based economy. Within the next 15 years Ireland can become one of the top five richest economies in the world. This would give Irish people the same income per capita as the US and Japan by 2020.
But the key will be the availability of many more engineers and IT specialists. And this, of course, brings us back to the crucial importance of maths, which is a critical stepping-stone to achieving those qualifications.
Engineers have been central to the development of the high technology sectors, such as the pharmaceutical, biomedical, information technology and the construction industries. These, in turn, have been at the core of Ireland's economic success in recent years. Over the last decade the number of engineers on the island has more than doubled, and the number of computer staff has increased fourfold.
At present, third level institutions on the island are producing 5,100 engineering graduates and 2,500 IT graduates from certificate, ordinary and honours degree programmes each year. But this is not enough to meet current demand.
The Engineering a Knowledge Island 2020 report estimated that 14,000 engineering and 6,900 IT graduates are required each year for Ireland to become a top five global economy by 2020.
To achieve that level of graduate throughput would mean increasing the number of engineering professionals and technicians by 7 per cent per year; IT professionals and technicians by 6 per cent per year, and engineering and IT PhDs by 13 per cent annually. However, if sufficient students do not take maths, physics or chemistry at higher level in the Leaving Cert we simply will not achieve these targets.
Implementing the recommendations of the Task Force on the Physical Sciences, published in 2002, would ensure that more students achieve high grades in physics and chemistry without compromising the high education standards for which Ireland is renowned. The task force identified two key initiatives: the provision of in-service training and support for teachers; and the upgrading of science laboratory facilities.
The negative coverage of student's reactions to higher level maths paper II is a setback to Engineers Ireland which, through the STEPS to engineering programme, is already working with the Government's Discover Science and Engineering initiative, encouraging young people to explore engineering and science in a fun and enquiring way.
If Ireland is to truly become a knowledge economy, the Government, through the Department of Education and Science, must ensure that the maths and science syllabuses deliver stimulating and instructive courses. Unless we increase the number of students with a high level of competency in maths and science, and in turn increase the output of engineers, IT and science graduates, the concept of a knowledge economy for Ireland will simply be just that - a concept.
John McGowan is president of Engineers Ireland
