Advanced mathematical skills and relating factors of engineering applicants: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

Higher education institutions assess applicants with entrance examinations as a way to identify and rank those applicants with adequate ability to proceed in their studies. Engineering students form a significant group of higher education students, both in Europe and Finland. Finnish universities of applied sciences (UASs) developed and harmonised their student selection in the Development Project in 2017–2020. In the Development Project, a new national digital universities of applied sciences entrance examination (UAS Exam) was developed. In the current study, a cross-sectional design was used to assess advanced mathematical skills and related factors of the bachelor-level engineering applicants performing the newly developed UAS Exam. The advanced mathematical skills exam section contains mathematics and physics problems. The data were collected via the digital exam system. Altogether, 1205 engineering applicants consented to the study and performed the exam section. The data were statistically analysed. The applicants’ mean scores were 4.8 (SD 5.2, median 3.9, range -4.9–20 pts) out of 20 maximum points. Over 20% of the applicants failed. Some of the background variables explain the applicants’ exam results, indicating that older applicants scored better than younger ones, males better than females, and high school graduates and applicants with previous higher education degrees better than those with vocational diplomas. The results indicate that engineering applicants’ advanced mathematical skills were rather poor, indicating that it may be possible that engineering applicants lack the basic skills in mathematics and physics, but this may vary between applicants.