SUBJECT: MNHQ here: How has maths helped your career?

[AnnaCMumsnet]

Women are underrepresented in science, technology, engineering and maths careers. The ratio of men vs women working in STEM has stalled at 74:26

There are lots of possible explanations for this, but the stats seem to show that disparities start fairly early. Girls are substantially less likely to take scientific, numerical and technical subjects at A Level, and an study from a few years ago showed that across OECD countries, girls are more likely than boys to express a lack of self-confidence when tackling maths and science problems - even though girls often outperform boys at GCSE level in these subjects.

We’ve been talking to Maths4Girls, who are trying to redress the balance. They say:

“We seek to dispel gender stereotypes and inspire more girls to pursue maths and the opportunities it can bring. We do this by introducing female role models to young girls aged 11 - 14 so they can share their inspirational career journey, and give insight into their amazing career.”

Some of the workshops Maths4Girls have run (for free) include using maths to solve crimes, to persuade people, and to save the world (by tackling the really big global challenges such as climate change).

We know from thousands of conversations on Mumsnet over the years that we have many brilliant women here who excel in maths and maths-related fields, so to support Maths4Girls in their mission we thought we’d try to find a few role models of our own.

How has maths helped your career? How do you use maths, from day to day, in your job - and what sort of difference does your job make in the world? Do you have any thoughts about what might have helped you when you were studying or breaking into your chosen field - or do you have any tips for the upcoming generations of girls and young women thinking about building a career in STEM?

(Feel free to namechange if your story is too identifying!)

Thanks
MNHQ

Im a nurse.
I took higher maths at A levels and then nursing at university
I use maths all day everyday in my role.
I love my job, and the varied and exciting career paths available

Do you have any thoughts about what might have helped you when you were studying or breaking into your chosen field - or do you have any tips for the upcoming generations of girls and young women thinking about building a career in STEM?

I have some advice for teachers.

Stop splitting the girls up and using them to control the behaviour of more disruptive students.

Whether we like it or not school is a social situation and if sharing a classroom is not a pleasant experience then it is going to put girls off.

As for me, I have used various bits of maths in my working life, including teaching it, but I love maths, and I love puzzles / problem solving for me it is something I enjoy just as someone else might enjoy painting or playing music.

I am an architect and obviously need maths for that, but I use maths for everything else. I use maths to bill my clients, to figure out which interest rate to go for when refinancing my house, maths to figure out what length of string lights to buy to go around my 8' diameter umbrella. Maths to double recipes. Maths to calculate how soon I am going to go broke paying for my kids' education. Maths to calculate how much fabric to buy to make curtains. Maths to figure who has the cheapest prices on paper towel and toilet paper. Who doesn't use maths.

Most importantly start teaching maths so it applies to everyday things instead of theoretical stuff that kids don't care about. In my day it was all about filling bathtubs. My kids' maths was all about measuring rooms. How many 7 year old or 12 year olds or 17 year olds care about how long it takes to fill the bath or what the measurements of their living room are. How about divying up the cost of sweets, or planning a road trip to see their favorite band. The cleverest math assignment I ever saw was my dd's home economics teacher (don't ask...after a lifetime of fighting for home economics not to be a required girls class, my dd and her friend decided to petition the school to start a home economics class)....anyway, the assignment was to budget for a week's holiday. They had to figure out petrol and food and hotels and contingency costs. She had a blast and learned loads in the process.

I work in TV in quite a creative role but still use maths a fair bit. Mostly for analysing audience data.

I hace practically zero maths although luckily a strong analytical mind which has pulled me through a number of senior leadership roles in spite of it. I so think a good maths background would have helped, mainly to figure out why there are so many errors in our spreadsheets... 😆

I have encouraged my children to take maths seriously and I think most of them will take it to a level.

@SofiaAmes

* after a lifetime of fighting for home economics not to be a required girls class,*

When was it last a required class for girls? In your lifetime?

I feel there is a big difference between being able to use mathematical concepts, and being able to calculate.
So I was always quick to figure out how to solve the problem, but then actually solving it was really difficult and time consuming (without a calculator).
Because gcse maths has 2 papers, a calculator and non calculator paper, I could never feel that I was good at maths even though I do have an aptitude for understanding data and statistics, and enjoy geometry and patterns. It also meant I can’t take mathematical study any further, because I am weak at calculation.

I have a child who is the same as me, maths wise and has a specific learning difficulty. She would like to study physics, and we all know that this is not a good idea without maths.
So different routes into maths would be helpful.
More research into stumbling blocks in learning maths would be helpful, then this could be used to inform curriculum and assessment methods to enable broader sections of people to study maths.

@Sometimesfraught82
Sophia Ames alludes to paying for private education, the curricula there canbe different to state school

Certainly not any of the maths I learnt at school. More emphasis should be put on teaching "real-life" maths such as financial education.

I work in publishing so, for me, I rarely ever use maths at work.

I'm a nurse so use basic straight forward maths often in my job in calculating medication doses. Nothing complex.

Physics teacher here so without Maths I would not be able to do Physics.

I was allowed to really coast in maths at school, although I enjoyed it I was lazy and left with a c in GCSE maths. I've since trained to use psychometric assessments as part of my job which involved learning about statistics and I'm currently doing an MSc that involves statistical research. I'm really enjoying it. I really regret not working harder at maths at school and university (where I decided I couldn't do statistics in my geography degree and again coasted a pass in that module).

I was doing fine at Maths at school (middle set) until old 2nd yr / now yr 8 when we had 2 maths teachers covering our set. They were supposed to be teaching half the syllabus each, but both taught the same half, so missed out of half the syllabus. (It was our fault by the way.....)

Never really caught up until I was put down to bottom set in 4th yr / yr10 with a incredible teacher Mrs T. OMG how that woman worked. I passed with a B - I was so shocked & amazed. As I walked into assembly at the start of LVIth she ran from the back of the hall to hug me. Still makes me tear up to this day 40+ yrs later.

Did stats for my Psychology degree and have used Maths throughout my working life - basically 3 careers. Can still do a multivariate analysis 'by hand' although my mental arithmetic is a bit rusty - sorry Mrs T

I did a medical microbiology degree, studied all he sciences at GCSE and A-level. And don't use any of them in my career now

I’m a Primary Maths Specialist Teacher. It’s a qualification I took after qualifying as a teacher and it was 2 years of post-graduate level study.
I love teaching maths and try to impart that love to all my pupils (usually ks2). I’m particularly keen to help them to use manipulatives to see patterns and relationships between numbers. Although I hated algebra at school, I really enjoy teaching it and hope that no-one in my class feels the same way I did.

I write scientific software.
I did double maths A levels because maths, physics and double maths (pure and applied, back then 1977-1979 rather than FM) was the only way to do 4 subjects else I'd have done C, P, M and biology.
I was the only girl in the school doing physics, the only one in my chemistry set (a few who did biology were in another set), and only one other girl did double maths. Weirdly, it didn't really occur to me this was odd at the time - and between us we always beat the boys.

So, onwards to a chemistry degree, not too keen on lab work but was wowed by crystallography- which of all undergrad chemistry options is perhaps the one most requiring good maths. A PhD included writing some code to do stuff that wasn't available off the shelf and thence into a job in the very new field of molecular modelling. 35 years later still at it, happily wfh for the last 25 - excellent for work life balance and combining with being a parent, as it turned out.

My job requires a variety of maths from time to time - lots of coordinate geometry and matrix algebra but also statistics , other stuff from time to time.

I’m an actuary, so my job requires maths skills everyday, without maths skills I wouldn’t be able to perform my job.

Like some other posters, my maths degree led me to chartered accountancy, and in my audit days many years ago my firm introduced some quite sophisticated sampling techniques which my background helped me to understand. In my last job I dealt a lot with actuaries, and again my degree meant that I could understand and sometimes challenge what they were doing. And of course as a heavy spreadsheet user I was doing a lot of practical algebra every day.

More generally, I instinctively use numbers to try to get the ‘big picture’ understanding of situations - how much? how big? how old? - and this is a way of thinking rather than a particular mathematical technique.

More generally still, mathematicians are fanatical about precise definitions and logical reasoning. It’s not hard to think of topics of conversation on these boards that would benefit from a focus on definition of terms.

Maths is an unforgiving subject, but to me it represents the supreme intellectual achievement of humanity. To misquote JFK, we do these things because they are hard, not because they are easy. We should expect our daughters to rise to the challenge.

Maths is an unforgiving subject, but to me it represents the supreme intellectual achievement of humanity. To misquote JFK, we do these things because they are hard, not because they are easy. We should expect our daughters to rise to the challenge.

I've just been proofreading DDs 4th year engineering project report - lots of maths being put to practical use, on a course she deliberately chose because it was hard.

My undergrad is in biology and, like all sciences required strong maths skills. I didnt do a level maths but was reasonable in school. I'm in health management now and use maths for days analysis, understanding statistics and applying to my area, planning capacity and demand, and managing a budget of £30m. Strong maths skills are really important on my area, although I know some senior managers bluff it or rely on someone else to understand/explain to them. My dd is starting a levels next year and is planning to do STEM subjects. She wants to study marine biology at uni so will require robust maths skills.

I think it is so surprising that girls are often leading the pack in maths at school yet so few go on to higher level study/careers.

I absolutely love maths, I am a qualified accountant a teacher a manager of a Pre-School and a mum to 4 kids, I have used my maths skills in absolutely every one of these roles and every day. It is a vital life skill and is so important that we must make our children aware of its importance for the future. I had great teachers too in maths, economics, commerce, statistics and accountancy, they inspired me to love it. I know teachers today are the same, trying to give the love for the subject to everyone..it is definitely not just for males..that makes me angry ...pheeeewww !!!!!

Just because you are good at something doesnt mean you'll be interested in it. I was always strong in stem subjects, my parents forced/convinced me that arts was worthless so i did a science degree then drifted into a qualified accountant role. I think that is often the case in countries where girls do stem out of necessity/practical reasons (e.g. middle east..). Finally had the guts to move to a more creative career.

However maths is infinitely useful in personal finance, everyday life.

Just want to offer another viewpoint. I loved lego as a child, but like many girls do not have any interest in engineering or mechanical objects. Similarly, I could code and have the aptitude to, but had zero interest in going into tech.

I teach about maths and its foundations frequently. I'm a lecturer in philosophy and logic at well-known university and teach formal logic and philosophy of maths to humanities students as well as those doing maths or physics and philosophy. One of the challenges is to teach formal thinking to people who firmly believe that they can't do it; a lot are young women who do not have confidence and it's great to see them put the work in and do well.

I never thought I was particularly good at maths (and certainly wasn't told that I was). Teachers (with a couple of exceptions) didn't tend to push me to do better or to encourage me in either maths or physics (which is odd, given that I was often top of the class). The careers officer told me to aim lower (1980s). Fortunately, I had parents who weren't of the same view, although they didn't know enough maths to encourage me.

Only when I got to university did I realise that I really enjoyed the maths part of the course (which I had to do because I was doing physics). The philosophy research I do is almost as abstract as pure maths and the imagination and rigorous thinking needed for analysis is still useful. So, although I don't tend to calculate anything very often (aside from helping the DCs with homework), I still use skills I gained in maths every day.

I should add, I never found maths easy despite being good at it. I had to work to get it.

@AxiomOfChoice

I should add, I never found maths easy despite being good at it. I had to work to get it.

Yes I agree, It didn't come easy to me either, I had to work hard to 'get it' but I did enjoy maths, even though it was hard work.