Isaac Rosenthal: Understanding for All: Insights into Assessing and Fostering Numeracy in General Education Science Courses

Approximately 250,000 students enroll in gen-ed astronomy courses (i.e., “Astro 101”) annually, representing roughly 10% of the entire U.S. college student population. For many of these students, such courses serve as their final formal exposure to STEM and therefore offer a critical opportunity to develop their ability to recognize and apply mathematical concepts in real-world situations (i.e., numeracy). Numeracy is a critical skill which influences our decisions and behavior across many aspects of modern-day life. Despite its importance, low numeracy poses an issue on a global scale; one exacerbated by the challenges associated with both effective education as well as equitable evaluation. Additionally, many non-scientists do not perceive these skills to be especially relevant or useful to them, further limiting their engagement with these topics. In higher education, this is reflected by the large number of students who enroll in the minimum possible number of STEM courses (typically general education courses intended for non-majors). As a result, these courses can have outsized impacts on the numeracy of the non-STEM majors that take them. In this talk, I will discuss findings and insights gained from a large-scale, national study of numeracy in undergraduate students, emphasizing both the relationship between affective factors (e.g., math-related anxiety) and numeracy, as well as more broadly addressing the challenges with evaluating numeracy in a fair and equitable way.