Sydney uni removing advanced maths prerequisites (1 Viewer)

[tywebb]

Sydney University abandons HSC prerequisites in diversity push

The university says the move will allow it to attract a greater range of students. It will offer bridging courses to catch pupils up.

www.smh.com.au

Sydney uni are removing advanced maths prerequisites

But more bums on seats just leads to more failing students.

Also, it sends the wrong message, eg., it doesn’t matter if you did advanced maths - but then they find out the hard way that actually it did matter and end up failing.

So do you think this move by Sydney uni is good or bad?

 

[its_ace21]

That’s kinda dumb like imagine a person who didn’t do math in highschool choose a degree that needs math

 

[totally_screwed]

I think that's fair, advanced maths isn't even hard people can catch up and I'm sure those enrolling in maths without an advanced background will be aware of that

 

[Drongoski]

Sydney University abandons HSC prerequisites in diversity push

The university says the move will allow it to attract a greater range of students. It will offer bridging courses to catch pupils up.

www.smh.com.au

Sydney uni are removing advanced maths prerequisites

But more bums on seats just leads to more failing students.

Also, it sends the wrong message, eg., it doesn’t matter if you did advanced maths - but then they find out the hard way that actually it did matter and end up failing.

So do you think this move by Sydney uni is good or bad?

Bad!

Unis are nowadays often run by bureaucrats (Scott currently at USyd) - not by administrators with an academic background. I think it is a retrograde step and, as you have said, sends a wrong message. When I went to uni long long ago, there were no such thing as ATARs. Each course has its well-defined set of prerequisites. No Physics (with good grades), no Engineering; etc. Unis admissions are now often a con job.

 

[tywebb]

Bad!

Unis are nowadays often run by bureaucrats (Scott currently at USyd) - not by administrators with an academic background. I think it is a retrograde step and, as you have said, sends a wrong message. When I went to unilong long ago, there were no such thing as ATARs. Each course has its well-defined set of prerequisites. No Physics (with good grades), no Engineering; etc. Unis admissions are now often a con job.

Well another consequence of this is probably even fewer students taking advanced maths which no amount of bureaucratic spin could argue is a good thing.

 

[its_ace21]

A lot of standard kids from my school go do engineering and then they complain that the math is so much 🫥

 

[Masaken]

Sydney University abandons HSC prerequisites in diversity push

The university says the move will allow it to attract a greater range of students. It will offer bridging courses to catch pupils up.

www.smh.com.au

Sydney uni are removing advanced maths prerequisites

But more bums on seats just leads to more failing students.

Also, it sends the wrong message, eg., it doesn’t matter if you did advanced maths - but then they find out the hard way that actually it did matter and end up failing.

So do you think this move by Sydney uni is good or bad?

that's so dumb lol, but not surprised considering unis in australia at least are pretty much cash cows (you can already see how low the bar is when it comes to entry of international students in the go8 compared to domestic students) so i have this feeling this move is pretty much a way to get more students = more money and if they fail the maths course they have to take it again = more money rip

"From next year, Year 12 students who achieve a Band 3 or higher in advanced mathematics will also be eligible to receive an additional point towards their selection rank under the university’s Academic Excellence Scheme." also band 3 in 2u gets bonus points?? like a mark in the 60s?? ain't no way

 

[liamkk112]

i think this is okay for some degrees, like i doubt you really need advanced math for a degree in nursing, so there's not really much point in having it as a prereq so it makes sense. however it is outrageous that there's no advanced math prereq for literally a math degree lmao, and economics too given how much it relies on calculus in many situations. i also think this is bad as it may mislead students into thinking they can do standard and will be able to thrive in a uni course reliant on math, when this is not the case.

however, most other aus unis like uts, unsw, etc don't have prereq subjects at all, they just have "recommended studies" and usyd only added the prereqs in recent times (2016?). so i hope at least usyd will write on the degrees that they change that it is recommended to still study advanced, so at least students will still be motivated to learn math that may or may not be relevant to their degree and their success in it.

here's the list of the affected degrees by the way: https://boredofstudies.org/threads/sydney-uni-removing-advanced-maths-prerequisites.407723/
i think this news article exagerrated the news, it's not ALL math prereqs it's just some of them, some of which i think are bad decisions and some which i think are less so.

 

[liamkk112]

that's so dumb lol, but not surprised considering unis in australia at least are pretty much cash cows (you can already see how low the bar is when it comes to entry of international students in the go8 compared to domestic students) so i have this feeling this move is pretty much a way to get more students = more money and if they fail the maths course they have to take it again = more money rip

"From next year, Year 12 students who achieve a Band 3 or higher in advanced mathematics will also be eligible to receive an additional point towards their selection rank under the university’s Academic Excellence Scheme." also band 3 in 2u gets bonus points?? like a mark in the 60s?? ain't no way

unsw and uts give 1 point for a band 4 in a lot of subjects too, a 70% is a better mark than 60% but still.

 

[Aeonium]

"From next year, Year 12 students who achieve a Band 3 or higher in advanced mathematics will also be eligible to receive an additional point towards their selection rank under the university’s Academic Excellence Scheme." also band 3 in 2u gets bonus points?? like a mark in the 60s?? ain't no way

unsw and uts give 1 point for a band 4 in a lot of subjects too, a 70% is a better mark than 60% but still.

isn't band 4 meant to be 'satisfactory' or 'expected' outcome for a student ? this scheme is weird i'm 99% sure anyone who does 2u can band 4 with bare minimum/low effort

 

[Masaken]

unsw and uts give 1 point for a band 4 in a lot of subjects too, a 70% is a better mark than 60% but still.

isn't band 4 meant to be 'satisfactory' or 'expected' outcome for a student ? this scheme is weird i'm 99% sure anyone who does 2u can band 4 with bare minimum/low effort

yeah i know they do but i mean i’m not really a fan of it, especially when they (unis like unsw) market it like strong performance in specific hsc subjects gets rewarded. like if band 4 is the standard minimum performance i feel like it shouldn’t be rewarded with bonus points but yeah band 5/6 should (and it also provides students with the incentive to meet or even exceed the minimum standards and do better in their subjects and thus also be better prepared for uni)

 

[liamkk112]

yeah i know they do but i mean i’m not really a fan of it, especially when they (unis like unsw) market it like strong performance in specific hsc subjects gets rewarded. like if band 4 is the standard minimum performance i feel like it shouldn’t be rewarded with bonus points but yeah band 5/6 should (and it also provides students with the incentive to meet or even exceed the minimum standards and do better in their subjects and thus also be better prepared for uni)

its pretty clear they give away bonus points bc they want more people at their uni lol, same reason why early entry exists. tbh the uni could care less about your performance unless if you're in one of their prestiguous courses like med or law and then all of a sudden you can't get early entry or bonus points because they only want to cherry pick to keep their "reputation", yet with everything else they just want to give out as many spots as possible to max their income

 

[Drongoski]

I recall having a chat with a stranger about 10 years ago who told me he was doing Electrical Engineering at USyd, but did not study Physics for his HSC. They let him do it. May well have eventually completed his B Eng(Electrical). Miracles do happen! Scott Morrison is right after all.

 

[tywebb]

The excuse Sydney uni gave was teacher shortage resulting in low SES schools unable to offer the higher level maths courses.

But embracing mediocrity created by inept schools and lowering the standard of the university isn't a solution. It's just going to result in more problems like more students failing.

The solution is to fix the inept schools to give the low SES schools more equity of access to the higher level maths courses.

 

[its_ace21]

The excuse Sydney uni gave was teacher shortage resulting in low SES schools unable to offer the higher level maths courses.

But embracing mediocrity created by inept schools and lowering the standard of the university isn't a solution. It's just going to result in more problems like more students failing.

The solution is to fix the inept schools to give the low SES schools more equity of access to the higher level maths courses.

and to not allow schools to force subjects

 

[tywebb]

and to not allow schools to force subjects

Even more insidious is the practice of encouraging students who are amply capable of doing advanced maths to take standard instead to get a higher atar. Regardless of atar this ultimately disadvantages them if they intend to do a maths-dependent degree.

 

[oml]

yomg my connections were right, im dropping math

 

[Cathode_RT]

that's so dumb lol, but not surprised considering unis in australia at least are pretty much cash cows (you can already see how low the bar is when it comes to entry of international students in the go8 compared to domestic students) so i have this feeling this move is pretty much a way to get more students = more money and if they fail the maths course they have to take it again = more money rip

"From next year, Year 12 students who achieve a Band 3 or higher in advanced mathematics will also be eligible to receive an additional point towards their selection rank under the university’s Academic Excellence Scheme." also band 3 in 2u gets bonus points?? like a mark in the 60s?? ain't no way

The minimum mark for a B3 in advanced math is 22%
thats not even a standard you have to genuinely have to have mental/physical issues going on to get that low.

 

[scaryshark09]

ok that is just dumb
they really want their students to fail so they make more money / choose a different course and leave students taking subjects that wont even count towards their degree.
and the band 3 thing. really? someone getting 22% does not deserve a bonus point

how do you guys think this will influence their reputation as top universities?

 

[liamkk112]

ok that is just dumb
they really want their students to fail so they make more money / choose a different course and leave students taking subjects that wont even count towards their degree.
and the band 3 thing. really? someone getting 22% does not deserve a bonus point

how do you guys think this will influence their reputation as top universities?

probably will have no change lol