EXCELLENCE IN UK EDUCATION


British industry is taking on the development of a passion for STEM subjects among the UK’s schoolchildren. Rolls-Royce, for example, has set itself the ambitious target of reaching six million people through its STEM education programmes and activities by 2020. “We employ world- leading


experts creating world-leading technology,” says


Nicola Swaney, education outreach manager at Rolls-Royce. “But, to continue doing this, we need to create and inspire the next generation of engineers, scientists and mathematicians.”


MATHS: THE 'MASTERY' APPROACH Following recent international tests, which showed that pupils in Shanghai, Singapore and Hong Kong performed consistently better than their counterparts in England, the UK government took steps to revise maths teaching in English schools. Shanghai topped the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) test tables in 2012, with 15-year-olds there judged to be three years ahead of pupils in England. Following visits to schools in China teaching the lauded maths methods, the Asian ‘maths mastery’ approach has been adopted in a selection of schools in England. It is typified by careful planning and ensuring that all children have a grasp


of the toughest maths principles, building on their depth of understanding of the structure of maths.


The UK government has made £41 million available to train


teachers in the new method. So far, 140 teachers from primary schools in England have been trained by a National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM), which was established to help schools adopt the approach. The government’s commitment to placing STEM at the heart of education policy has underpinned much of the recent education reform in England. In a government report, STEM education was pronounced “the foundation of future economic success” and instrumental in driving innovation and economic growth. Recent reforms to the National Curriculum, GCSEs and A Levels have included more challenging content in mathematics and the sciences and a move to more rigorous assessment, while slimming down the curriculum in other subjects. It is clear that the UK consistently punches above its weight in terms of its international reputation in delivering quality STEM teaching at higher-education levels. Schools in the independent and state sectors are following suit with a raft of innovations in STEM and STEAM teaching, including increased rigour in state schools through the government's programme of education reform and the independent sector's commitment to developing the innovators of the future.


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