The specific GS objectives relating to the Department of Mathematics and Statistics include: A student will be able to:
- apply functions and other mathematical relationships to the analysis of a wide variety of applied problems,
- use one or more of a variety of mathematical methodologies, including but not limited to algebraically based deduction, statistical processes, the limit, the derivative, or the integral, to define, analyze, and solve a diverse selection of applied problems,
- use the "language" of mathematics and/or statistics to effectively communicate problem analysis and solutions and think critically and use reasoning in solving applied problems,
- demonstrate the ability to express formal, mathematical relationships using logical analyses and differing forms of mathematical reasoning,
- demonstrate the ability to utilize mathematical techniques in order to define problems and to search for strategies for testing solutions, and
- demonstrate the ability to manage and interpret numerical data using the appropriate mathematical tools.
Students in four math courses were given additional items on their final exam, which were linked to specific GS objectives. In each of the Tables below, the percentage of students who passed each question (i.e., received 60% of the points) is listed. The questions themselves are listed in Appendix A (See Department for copy).
| Math 115 |
Related
Objective
|
Question #
|
% of students who
attained 60% or better
|
b
|
2
|
100
|
c
|
3
|
90.5
|
b
|
5a
|
66.7
|
b
|
5b
|
85.7
|
b
|
5c
|
100
|
a, d, e
|
7
|
76.2
|
c
|
8
|
100
|
f, b
|
9
|
85.7
|
b
|
10
|
66.7
|
| Math 123 |
Related
Objective
|
Question #
|
% of students who
attained 60% or better
|
a
|
1
|
63.3
|
b
|
2
|
63.3
|
b
|
3
|
73.3
|
b
|
4
|
76.7
|
a, b
|
5
|
60.0
|
a, b, d
|
6
|
76.7
|
| Statistics 241 |
Related
Objective
|
Question #
|
% of students who
attained 60% or better
|
a, c
|
1a
|
81.4
|
a, b, d
|
1b
|
60.5
|
c
|
1c
|
79.1
|
a, b, c, d
|
2a
|
76.7
|
a, b, c, d
|
2b
|
62.8
|
a, c
|
3a
|
39.5
|
a, b, d
|
3b
|
60.5
|
c
|
3c
|
82.4
|
a, c
|
4a
|
82.4
|
a, b, d
|
4b
|
82.4
|
c
|
4c
|
91.2
|
a, c
|
5a
|
82.4
|
a, b, d
|
5b
|
73.5
|
c
|
5c
|
94.1
|
It must be noted that the sample of students for these questions includes those who might end up failing the course anyway. So the percentage of students who passed each item AND passed the course would be higher. The questions themselves were constructed by the faculty members and thus were not pretested for difficulty level nor standardized on a large sample. Nonetheless, the proportion of students passing each item ranges from 66.7% to 100% for Math 115, from 60 to 76.7% for Math 123, and from 39.5 to 94,1% for Stat 241.