6th IMA Conference on Mathematical Education of Engineers

Date: Sunday 6 – Wednesday 9 April 2008
Location: Loughborough University, UK

A unique event in engineering mathematics education took place at Loughborough University, UK between 6th and 9th April. The Institute of Mathematics & its Applications and the Mathematics Working Group of the Societe Europeenne de la Formation des Ingenieuers collaborated to hold a joint meeting of over 80 delegates.

The IMA Mathematical Education of Engineers conferences have been held at Loughborough since 1994. They began partly in response to the steady decline in mathematical preparedness of undergraduate students entering engineering programmes at UK universities and were noteworthy for the focus they put on the core and key knowledge that student engineers might gain. The IMA actively addresses the needs of employers in its branch meetings so a key feature of all the IMA/MEE conferences has been links with industry and industrial delegates being invited to give keynote talks. The SEFI-MWG began its work in 1982 as an international forum for exchanging experiences in engineering mathematics, understanding the role of mathematics in the engineering curriculum, fostering cooperation in course development and support material, and recognising a role for mathematics in continuing engineering education. In 1992 the SEFI-MWG published an advisory core curriculum of mathematics to be followed in European institutions where professional engineers are formed, and in 2002 both updated and revised this curriculum with the inclusion of learning objectives. Its current activities include a comparison of the widely different forms of assessment in European institutions, an ongoing interest in the most effective use of technology, and styles of teaching that should be adopted to optimise student understanding…