Science and Math Enrollments Reach New High In UK

ianare writes "There has been a continued increase in the number of students taking A-level science and maths subjects. Physics has been especially popular. A growing fascination with science and teacher support schemes seem to be improving the teaching of maths and physics in UK state schools. From the article: 'There is evidence that two teacher support schemes funded by the Department for Education and run by the Institute of Physics and Mathematics in Education and Industry are beginning to make a big difference. The IOP runs a network in England designed to help science teachers teach physics, called the Stimulating Physics Network. The MEI has a similar scheme called the Further Mathematics Support Programme. There is compelling evidence that much of the rise in the numbers of A-level students comes from schools participating in the scheme.'"

Comments

Investing.

[wisdom_brewing]

So the Government invests in education and this yields results.

Shocking!

This is good.

[Hazel Bergeron]

I regret not doing more mathematics the first time round at A level, but there are problems to be addressed. I did turn my degree ("major", as Americans seem to call it) toward mathematics, and for preparatory work ended up doing another math A-level via private study, for which I received the top % in the country for that exam board. But all I really did was cram the study books published by the same company which produced the exams.

At a ceremony thing, following a long discussion with some of the staff at the board, I was immediately offered a trial position. I stupidly didn't take it. Well, I know at the time I was recovering from an illness which had just appeared and wasn't really thinking straight about what I could do long term. But I would like to have played at least some part in turning it more from a "learn for the test" thing into a "learn problem-solving" thing.

Simpler explanation

[RogueyWon]

I think there's probably quite a simple explanation for this. The amount of debt that students in England and Wales will likely need to take on (barring rich parents) to pay for a degree has risen significantly from this year (not quite at US levels yet, but getting much closer). At the same time, the huge expansion in the numbers going to university has meant that the chances of a degree leading to graduate-level employment have fallen sharply.

The perception now is that if you want to go from university into a "good" job, then you need either a science degree, or an arts degree from one of the elite institutions (Oxford, Cambridge, or one of the other top 10 or so universities). A decade ago, studying a "silly" degree for three years could be justified, from the point of view of an 18 year old, on the basis that it meant you got three years of the student lifestyle. If you didn't get a graduate-level job at the end of it, then at least it hadn't cost you all that much. This has changed now (and in a funny way, this is probably a good thing).

Whether the conventional wisdom will actually prove correct for students starting undergraduate degrees in September this year, I don't know. I suspect a maths degree will always make you more employable than a media studies one, but there's no reason to suspect that any portion of the graduate jobs market is immune to over-saturation.

As tends to get pointed out quite frequently, what we lack in the UK (and have lacked for decades now) is a network of decent technical colleges to prepare people for skilled non-academic jobs.

Re:Simpler explanation

[AtlanticCarbon]

Yes, this is likely related to the economy and changing attitudes about education.

Some of these attitudes are becoming a bit extreme though. I've noticed snobbery and contempt for people who don't specialize in math or science. It may ultimately lead to a sense of entitlement for these science and math majors that goes unsatisfied. Already in the post-doc world and in academia we see signs of saturation. And the salaries in these fields aren't high enough to indicate dramatic unmet demand.

More and more I think the educational arms race is a bad thing. Most of these people will not end up doing rocket science at a desk somewhere. Perhaps the education will benefit society more indirectly but I think in many cases it may be a waste of time and money in the long run.

Re:Simpler explanation

[wisdom_brewing]

Thank XXXX for that. So many A-Levels these days are in ridiculous subjects, thankfully the trend AWAY from Maths and Science is coming to an end.

In the UK the government went with a target (set on a EU level) of having 50% of the population in higher education (not realising the vocational side of things that is common in other European countries such as Germany that count towards this goal).

You end up with half the population with a degree is a useless subject and unemployable as you are "overqualified" for roles that do not require a degree.

You might not end up using Maths in your day to day job, but the logical mentality that it encourages is very useful in other aspects of life - even simple things like managing your budget.

We don't need thousands of Media Studies graduates with huge debt, we need Scientists, Entrepreneurs and many other roles that are currently being filled by imported labour. I can't remember the last time I saw an English plumber or electrician - those skills are needed here and the pay for those roles is ridiculously high in the UK compared to other countries (I know a plumber who makes the equivalent of USD 200k a year 5 years after getting his qualifications).

Anyway, rant over.

Re:Simpler explanation

[serviscope_minor]

The amount of debt that students in England and Wales will likely need to take on

The amount of what in Wales?

The Welsh assembly 100% subsidises university fees for their students (paid of course from English taxes!).

Re:Simpler explanation

[xaxa]

My younger sister, and some of my friends who were just starting university when I was just finishing, have science degrees from good (in several cases very good) universities, and are struggling to find appropriate jobs.

One has a degree in Biochemistry from Imperial, and was told last month by the Jobcentre staff that she'd have a better chance finding a job if she removed it from her CV! (She's had a succession of temporary jobs, boring office work etc, all with the promise of a permanent position at a later date, but that always seems to go to the less-qualified person who the company presumably assume will stick around for longer).

My sister found a job doing data entry for a company in her field (bio-somethingorother), hoping that would lead somewhere, but it hasn't.

I think there seem to be better opportunities elsewhere in the EEA, but people seem unwilling to move. I can understand that a little, but at 21 I thought it would be great to go and live in another country (I applied for a couple, but was offered a job in the UK within days of starting to look anyway).

Meanwhile, the place I work struggles to find computer science graduates, as we don't pay anywhere near enough to compete with the City, so we have to find idealists who really want to work for a charity, and they're rare.

Re:Simpler explanation

[xaxa]

I think there's probably quite a simple explanation for this. The amount of debt that students in England and Wales will likely need to take on (barring rich parents) to pay for a degree has risen significantly from this year (not quite at US levels yet, but getting much closer).

I've read that many potential students don't understand one very important difference between the American-style student debt and the English/Welsh version: in England/Wales the interest rate is low, and you don't have to pay back the debt until you earn over a certain amount (£15.7k), and the repayment amount is fixed (9% of income over £15.7k). The debt doesn't count on a credit score either.

It's somewhere between a debt and a graduate tax.

Re:Simpler explanation

[wisdom_brewing]

Overqualification is a serious problem (I almost consider using the term a form of discrimination) and Jobcentres are (unfortunately) next to useless...

My best friend has a Biochem degree from Oxford - I would say Imperial is on par in terms of reputation.

He's currently teaching Biology at a private school in Kent and absolutely loving it.

Biochem, its more or less impossible to find anything related other than clerical work unless you go beyond a BSc. Most of the exciting stuff you need to be at Phd level.

It all comes down to balance, but with a good science/maths degree you should be able to get a job paying above national average salary from the word go if you're willing to consider something less related to your course, of course peoples expectations are way off from reality.

And CompSci - yes finance/startups seem to be a massive draw and idealists are not easy to find when the cost of a degree is climbing so fast. Good luck to your employer with the hunt and to your sister and her friends!

Re:Simpler explanation

[chrb]

I think there seem to be better opportunities elsewhere in the EEA, but people seem unwilling to move.

Lack of personal mobility has been cited as one of, if not the most important, factor in regional and youth unemployment. I have a number of old friends and acquaintances who relocated to find work - usually to a large city within the same country, but sometimes further afield, to other continents, EU to/from US, to places like Dubai, Sri Lanka, Amsterdam, Germany etc. There are immigrants to the U.S. and U.K. who have left their friends and families, travelled hundreds, perhaps thousands, of miles, in search of work. Once they arrive, they compete in a jobs market where they are at a distinct disadvantage as they are not native speakers of the host nation's language - and yet, they find work.

On the other hand, I know people who moan that there are no jobs in their tiny village in the middle of nowhere, but are at the same time refuse to even consider relocating, because that would mean changing their lifestyle. Instead, these people continue to receive money from the tax payer to live in their location of choice, despite the probability of finding a job there being low. The government should, as a condition of receiving unemployment benefits, require people located in areas of high unemployment to relocate if there are appropriate jobs elsewhere.

Re:Simpler explanation

[chrb]

We don't need thousands of Media Studies graduates with huge debt, we need Scientists, Entrepreneurs and many other roles that are currently being filled by imported labour.

The problem is that 17 year olds generally have no idea what skills are in demand in the workplace. Perhaps every university should be required to write a letter to each prospective student, informing them of the ratio of graduates from that university with that particular degree in the last 5 years who are employed/unemployed, and the median salary. The letter could also point out similar degrees with better prospects. That way student choice would be retained, but it would be more informed. Alternatively, we could go the China route, and only fund the top % of students to study in-demand degrees, and consign everyone else to a lifetime of manual labour (gaokao: for poor households, the 30 percent of China’s population living on less than $2 a day, the gaokao is like a lottery ticket — but one whose rewards come not by chance, but through blood, sweat, tears and toil. For them, gaokao doesn’t translate as “high exam,” it translates as “test you must ace so your life won’t suck.").

Re:Simpler explanation

[xaxa]

I live in London, so I know loads of people who've relocated -- many semi/unskilled young people from Southern or Eastern Europe, but also plenty of skilled workers from Northern and Western Europe, and transient workers from Australia, NZ, SA etc. Half the people I meet aren't British. Some Swedish friends told me last night that London is the fourth-largest city by Swedish population.

I haven't checked any statistics, but I wouldn't be surprised if British people are some of the least mobile in the EU.

(FWIW, my sister/friends etc have probably been on benefits for less than six months between them. They can get unskilled temporary jobs in offices easily enough (and do so).)

The government should, as a condition of receiving unemployment benefits, require people located in areas of high unemployment to relocate if there are appropriate jobs elsewhere.

Agreed. Wasn't the whole point of Jobseeker's allowance to fund things like train travel to job interviews? (I could be wrong, I never needed to sign on.)

Re:Simpler explanation

[wisdom_brewing]

5th city of france as well. Yesterday was at a barbecue in Sevenoaks (small commuter town, traditionally very, very English) - the people present were...

Swedish
Polish
German
Japanese
Russian

London and the surrounding area has become a very international place (always was, but has become much more so in recent decades.

Jobseeker's allowance is meant to fund those things as well, but try taking a train from, say, Yorkshire to London for an interview at short notice - you wouldn't be able to afford the ticket.

Think free travel to interviews is something that should be looked into. Jobseekers allowance just about covers food. Though housing allowance, exemption from council tax, etc... are very generous.

I think you're right on the British being the least mobile, major limitation is that English is taught very widely abroad, but the British rarely learn any foreign languages beyond a basic level and the typical language learned is French, which isn't very useful. German, Spanish, Mandarin - those would be good.

Re:Simpler explanation

[wisdom_brewing]

The thresholds are actually being raised quite a bit, this is before

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/EducationAndLearning/UniversityAndHigherEducation/StudentFinance/Gettingstarted/DG_199403

and this is after

http://www.studentloanrepayment.co.uk/portal/page?_pageid=93,6678784&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL

But yes, very, very different to the US. Graduate tax is a good way of putting it.

Re:Science

[ciderbrew]

Will there be any jobs waiting for them when they come out of the system?

Re:Science

[History's Coming To]

Yes, most likely. There's a huge demand for physics and maths based degrees in the UK. There's a reasonable chance of getting a job in teaching or research, but the real boom area is financial services. Basically, if you can model money with PDEs you'll find a job (although I've known several people drop out of that field because of ethical issues). Physics is probably one of the most adaptable degree subjects, and certainly more employable than being one of the huge number of English Lit / Politics / Philosophy / Economics graduates.

Trendy

[PeterAitch]

There are many reasons which may have conflated to produce this result. I moved out of research 20 years ago and have been teaching physics in UK schools ever since, so I have seen various trends during that time.

Physics has always been perceived as hard (especially by girls) and considered geeky. Most of my students have either been out-and-out geeks or those aspiring to medicine/dentistry. A few have shifted into numerate careers (e.g. actuary, accountancy) and several into teaching.

Mostly pupils are interested in the sexier aspects - astrophysics or relativity or quantum theory, rather than mechanics or thermodynamics. Of course, at school level the really hard stuff doesn't kick in but it is still quite challenging for the vast majority of students.

A few years ago maths at A-level in the UK was made significantly easier (this is well-documented elsewhere) and took a lot of students who were considering doing physics as a "hard" option in order to go to medical school. To some extent this is still the case, but more people are doing physics as well. Why?

The courses feeding into A-level have been made easier - this gives people the [misleading] impression that they can cope with physics - and increases the course drop-out rate! Also, it is very valuable for entry on to competitive courses in good universities, but only if you get the top grades. Finally - and perhaps most importantly - it is seen as interesting, thanks to the influence of ambassadors such as Brian Cox (who has over 0.75 million followers on Twitter) and the well-reported recent events at CERN.

It will be fascinating to see how this develops - will the courses be "dumbed-down" (probably not, in the current political and economic climate). Will people realise that physicists are not necessarily directly employable? (I currently know two Ph.D.s who are still working as painters and decorators, several years on). Will the love affair with media science die away? (Again - it was last seen during the Moon landings and yours truly got sucked in as a boy...)

Re:Trendy

[Anonymous Coward]

Jobs for those with degrees, masters or PHD in physics.??

  Everything.

From banking, construction, engineering, ICT, essentially all technology, anything to do with numbers or handling data, anything to do with statistics, anything to do with problem solving. Every single field I've drifted into have found my skills invaluable.

Don't think Fermi could have been useful other than a physicist? Newton seemed to earn money doing numerous other jobs, as have many other physicists.

  I don't know what sort of physicists you guys know, but every single one graduate of my physics course (which is now shut down) have been in demand. In fact I've employed 5 of the 20 or so graduates that the program produced (over 10 years before being shut down).

PhD's tend to be less flexible being more specialised, but I would imagine would still be useful. Anything in Chemistry or Biology has at its core physics. Any device or technology in these fields also have at its core, physics. Hence why so many many physicists have won awards including nobel prizes in chemistry and biology in almost every major development (radioactivity, DNA, protons etc).

  PHD is physics isn't the point. If Chemists and Biologists had a better understanding of physics then they would be better chemists and biologists and not just robots that put things into black boxes and hope they get told an answer from a machine they don't understand how it works. (NMR, XRD, SEM, etc etc).

  Imagine engineers that had a solid understanding of material science. Engineers that understand how a PNP/NPN transistor, or a superconductor works, and not just simply apply and answer textbook questions because they are flat out just getting through the basics at uni. Imagine a population that understands the basics of the universe and a real science. Why the LHC is important, where energy comes from.

  Rutherford said it best. Science is physics, everything else is stamp collecting. Mighty words for someone who won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry...

Rock-star scientists

[leastsquares]

I think this trend has more to do with Brian Cox than any government initiative.

Re:Hope

[vlm]

Demand for skilled workers, especially in the USA, is still outstripping supply

At $7.25/hr part time no benefits under two years experience need not apply, over 30 years old need not apply.

For all other situations, not so good.

Re:Science

[History's Coming To]

In my case, because I wanted to know more about physics. Ideally I'd have gone on to work on one of the big telescopes in Hawaii, or possibly the Big Secret Hanger in Area 51, but I know when I was going into it that I may work in a field outside physics. Even these days, 15 years later, I still "do physics" on a regular basis, from fixing things to envelope calculations. The reason I went for physics in the first place were, in this order:

1: The pleasure of finding things out.
2: Something I knew would be useful whatever I did.
3: Getting a job.
4: Getting a job in physics.