Numeracy of First Year Commerce Students: Preliminary Analysis of an Intervention

By Michael Kremmer, Mark Brimble, Brett Freudenberg and Craig Cameron.

Published by The Learner Collection

Format	Price
Article: Print	$US10.00
Article: Electronic	$US5.00

Literacy and numeracy have become important global educational issues. Numeracy has been shown to impact on the performance of first year tertiary students and evidence suggests that students without recent maths studies are underprepared for programs such as science, IT, economics and accounting (Belward et al., 2007; Alcock et al., 2008). This paper uses a maths aptitude test developed by Ballard and Johnson (2004) to measure commencing commerce student maths abilities. Participating students are then offered a place in a maths workshop to assist with their basic maths skills. We find that the maths skills test is predictive of students’ performance in the first year statistics course. Qualitative evidence suggests that students benefited from the workshop in terms of skills development and confidence. We therefore suggest that commencing student attributes will influence graduate attributes and hence demand further attention.

Keywords:	Maths Aptitude, First Year Students, Numeracy

The International Journal of Learning, Volume 17, Issue 1, pp.1-14. Article: Print (Spiral Bound). Article: Electronic (PDF File; 850.083KB).

Michael Kremmer

Griffith University, Queensland, Australia

Assoc. Prof. Mark Brimble

Senior Lecturer, Griffith Business School, Griffith University, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

Dr. Brett Freudenberg

Senior Lecturer, Taxation, Griffith Business School, Griffith University, Meadowbrook, Queensland, Australia

Brett Freudenberg is currently a Senior Lecturer at the Griffith Business School within the Department of Accounting, Finance and Economics at Griffith University (Australia). In addition to his taxation teaching, Brett is enrolled in a PhD focusing on Tax Transparent Companies. In 2006 Brett received the Fulbright Award, which saw him conduct research at the University of Illinois to analyse the proliferation of new business forms in the United States and their potential for application to Australian businesses. Brett has received a number of teaching accolades, including most recently in 2008 a teaching citation from the Australian Learning & Teaching Council for his outstanding contributions to student learning. In 2007, he was part of a team that was awarded Griffith University’s “Excellence in Teaching for Programs that Enhance Learning Category”; and individually Brett received a “Certification of Commendation for Excellence in Teaching”. Previously, in 2005 he was jointly awarded a Griffith Business School Teaching Citation and in 2003 Brett received the Early Career Award for Teaching Excellence from Griffith University. He has pursued the scholarship of learning and has presented his research at number of teaching conferences, as well as publishing in refereed teaching journals. Prior to commencing with Griffith University, Brett was a senior taxation consultant with KPMG and a solicitor with Corrs Chambers Westgarth.

Craig Cameron

Lecturer, Griffith Business School, Griffith University, Meadowbrook, Queensland, Australia

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