Why we’ve got a maths teacher shortage (and why that’s a big problem)

It’s been revealed about 75 per cent of students in years 7 and 10 are being taught mathematics for a year by a teacher not specially trained in the subject.

A new report predicts the situation is only becoming worse due to growing student numbers and a 30-year decline in the number of people training to be maths teachers.

Professor Tim Brown from the Mathematical Sciences Institute told 3AW Breakfast the future depended on maths.

“Mathematics is absolutely crucial in all speech recognition, image recognition, artificial intelligence and machine learning,” he told Ross and Quarters.

“These are things that are going to be for Australia’s future, and mathematics is right at the heart of all those computer applications and algorithms.”

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