Addressing National and Regional Economic Development Goals through Effective Pedagogy of the Mathematical Sciences - Part I (An Example) and Part II (Discussions)

Some of the most challenging problems in most developing countries include mass unemployment of graduates from their higher educational institutions, lack of skills-deep entrepreneurial learning, and impoverished learning environments that impede creative innovations in the learning and teaching of most of the disciplines. These problems affect the ability of these nations to achieve economic development objectives, such as stipulated in the Millennium Development Goals, among other national and regional policy scripts. This paper discusses the role of innovative pedagogy of the mathematical sciences in producing new kinds of graduates who are prepared to be more employable and entrepreneurial in the way they utilize their knowledge and experiences in wealth creation and poverty alleviation. Part I of the paper uses a statistical modelling example to illustrate the new pedagogy. Part II of the paper discusses wider implications of the pedagogy, for repositioning mathematical sciences education and achieving targeted economic development objectives, nationally and regionally, in developing countries.