A new approach is required to address the crisis in Leaving Cert maths, which now fails to communicate its relevance to a significant number of students, writes Brian Mooney.

Today is the high point of the Leaving Certificate, with more students takings maths than any other subject during the entire examination.

Sadly, if the pattern of previous years is repeated, more than 5,000 students will fail the exam. A further 5,000-plus students will receive a result in foundation level maths which is not accepted by the vast majority of third- level colleges for entry into almost all their courses.

The question is this: why do we persist with a maths structure which leaves more than 10,000 students cut out of most options in the CAO process?

No other major subject is so harsh on students.

In 2004, 1,409 (17.6 per cent) students failed ordinary level biology, which creates difficulties for some, especially those interested in nursing. A little over 1,000 students, or 4 per cent, failed ordinary level Irish.

In no other major subject did the failure number reach 1,000 students, so the problem in maths and its implications for the students thus affected is unique.

All institutes of technology insist on at least ordinary level maths as a basic entry requirement.

They may allow foundation level maths in certain limited cases, where there is no maths content on the course (areas like art and design), but they will not award any points for it.

A grade C at ordinary level is required for most science and business/commerce courses.

No maths is required for places on arts, music, social science and law degrees in UCD, UCC, NUI Galway and Maynooth, unless maths or some other numerate subject is being studied, but the points requirement for all these courses are high. Colleges offering art courses generally do not require maths.

Finally, students contemplating taking post-Leaving Certificate courses through the VEC may not face a maths entry requirement.

Children study mathematics every school day of their life for at least 14 years. We are failing both ourselves and 20 per cent of our children in devising a system which regularly brands such a high number of students a failure after 14 years of instruction.

These same children can learn to operate the most complex features of modern technology in a matter of hours.

We must accept that over the 14 years of our primary and second-level education system, we have failed to communicate the relevance of maths to a significant cohort of our children.

This is our failure, not theirs, for which we punish them by blocking their progress into higher and further education.

As a young teacher accompanying a busload of students on a school tour in Europe in pre-euro days, I watched a group of them playing poker as we headed home, using their spare coins to bet, in up to six currencies.

Their capacity to instantly convert the value of each coin placed as a bet to ensure all bets were of equal value was amazing. Yet we can label these same students as failures in mathematics.

Our failure to ensure that all students leave school with a high standard of mathematical competency has serious long-term implications for both them and our society in general.

In a world of easily available instant credit, it is essential, for example, that we equip all our citizens with the basic skills of financial management, of which mathematical competency is the core.

The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, which advises the Minister for Education, needs to look again at the present structure of our mathematical curriculum.

In my view, the very concept of foundation-level anything is an insult at the end of a 14-year process, an acceptance of system failure and should be discarded.

The present higher-level curriculum, taken by 18 per cent of students, seems to meet the needs of those seeking employment as actuaries, engineers, computer scientists, theoretical physicists, mathematical scientists, economists, information technologists, industrial chemists/biochemists etc.

The council needs to devise a new ordinary level curriculum that addresses the needs of ordinary people in the living out of their lives.

The first criterion in devising such a curriculum should be its ability to engage the interest of all students by relating it in an experientially based way to mathematical aspects of day-to-day living.

The maths purists who will throw up their hands in horror at such a thought should be asked to examine all aspects of the current curriculum and to devise practical applications for all aspects they consider essential.

If no practical applications can be found for some elements of the current curriculum, then one would question what they are doing on an ordinary level mathematical curriculum.

It is time to go back to the drawing board with our ordinary level maths curriculum. Twenty per cent exclusion is not an option.