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What math skills learned in class do community college Workforce Development graduates use on the job?
I 'm a math education graduate student with the goal of obtaining a faculty position at a community college. I am interested in learning more about Workforce Development at community colleges. I am embarrassed to admit that, although I enjoy doing math and thinking about mathematical concepts for their own sake, I rarely use these skills for anything practical. With the above question, I want to compare and contrast the required math courses for various Workforce Development programs and the math actually used in these fields on the job itself. From this, I hope to learn how effective and relevant are community college math course curriculums for Workforce Development careers on the job in WD fields (i.e. nursing, electronics, nuclear medicine).
Public Comments
- As an Engineer who has gone through many math courses, I can say that I have not used any college level math on the job. The only math used on the job is addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, ratios, and percentages. While the college level math is not used, I feel that a new form of thinking was formed to assist in problem solving on the job.
- Wow, that's a toughy and most people dont' use them either! One serious defective example was when Canada switched from American to Metric and the people who put fuel into a jet got the MATH backwards and thought they put too much in, when they didn't even put enough in to get the plane half way there! I used addition, multiplcations and fractions daily, but I also use a calculator. I asked a 15 year old high school girl what 0.1 times 10 was and she couldn't answer that. I asked a 50 year old guy the other day and he said 5 Howard Stern is right when he laughs at girls who say the Capital of New York is New Jersey! The only people using math are accoutants, computer programmres and scientists. Everyone else is brain dead. JC Pennys give a simple math test of adding, subtracting, multiplications, divisiona nd fractions on their job application. No paper and pencil allowed. No calculators allowed. I learned to use proportional algorithms for astrology computations, but today programs do it for you. If you're a banker, realator, mortgage lender or scientist you have to learn Log e, but today progams do it for you! I pitty an astronaught in space whose computer goes down do to power failure and has to navigate with a sextant and do the math by hand. Even surveyors use GPS today! Math is the last artisan craft and it's now obsolete. OK I got one for you The 1040 tax form, with Schdule C for business and Shedual D for windfall profits. I defy evey YOU to master ACRS recovery on for items depreciation! Make them do the tax forms. The incentive is they don't have to pay H and R Block $200 or buy a program for $75 to do it. If they can do the IRS 1040, depreciation and amortization, C and D, they can do most anything!
