We describe our approach to incorporating a civic engagement component into a quantitative literacy (QL) course and the resulting gains in student learning, confidence, and awareness of local civic issues. We revised the existing QL course by including semester-long group projects involving local community issues that students could investigate using the mathematical topics of the course. Compared to students in the standard QL course, students in the projects-based course performed similarly on all topics on the post-test except one, and significantly better on that one topic. They showed increased awareness of community issues, gained confidence in their ability to respond to mathematical situations using course material, and reported learning non-mathematical skills. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The current business environment is awash in vast amounts of data that ongoing transactions continually generate. Leading-edge corporations are using business analytics to achieve competitive advantage. However, educators are not adequately preparing business school students in quantitative methods to meet this challenge. For more than half a century, business schools have relied mostly on a course in calculus and a course in statistics to meet the needs of their students despite an information-based business climate that has changed significantly. The authors propose that educators prepare students in the areas of mathematical modeling and risk management and quantitative skills, teaching them in the context of meaningful business problems. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This piece describes a first-year college seminar course that demonstrates the utility of quantitative literacy in identifying, understanding, and addressing issues of social justice. Social justice is another concept that is defined in different ways depending on context, but it is not widely seen as having a substantial intersection with mathematics. The definition offered here is broad enough to encompass most commonly acknowledged issues of social justice, and politically neutral enough to be acceptable to most readers. It is based on Aristotle's theory of distributive justice discussed in the "Nicomachean Ethics": Social justice concerns the fairness of distribution of the benefits and burdens that arise from living in a community. Because fair distribution is fundamentally a quantitative idea, mathematics is a critical ingredient (though certainly not the sole ingredient) for a healthy appreciation of social justice. This essay provides a context for the course, a description of it, and the motivation for offering it, and demonstrates how its design suits that motivation. It includes responses of various stakeholders to the course, and reflects on learning opportunities the course provides. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER] Note - This article can only be obtained through Interlibrary Loan.