27/08/2020

Experts highlight the impact of mathematics on the market.

Mathematical professions are responsible for generating approximately 15% of the GDP of countries like France, the Netherlands, and Spain. In Brazil, such activities could generate R$ 1 trillion annually for the economy, but much remains to be done in basic education to reach that number. This warning was given by the Director-General of IMPA, Marcelo Viana, during his video participation in the webinar "The job market and the role of mathematics post-pandemic" . The meeting is part of the series "And what about mathematics?", an initiative of the Sidarta Institute , in partnership with Itaú Social and with the support of IMPA.

“Mathematics plays a crucial role in the education of young people and children, in building citizenship, and has a very concrete importance in the economy. This signals to all of us involved in the educational process that we need to provide our young people, our students, with the tools to 'mine' this wealth,” he emphasized.

To try and outline what the market will look like after the pandemic, the broadcast featured innovation scientist Charles Bezerra, Antonio Carlos Pipponzi, president of the Board of Directors of Raia Drogasil, who worked at the Institute for Retail Development (IDV) until 2018, and Ya Jen Chang, president of the Sidarta Institute. The discussion was moderated by journalist Marcelo Soares, director of Lagom Data .

Based on the World Bank's perspective presented in 2019, Ya Jen highlighted that professions tend to increasingly demand technological know-how , problem-solving, and critical thinking, in addition to interpersonal skills. "The question is no longer whether professions will be replaced by robots, but which jobs will be redefined and how," she pointed out.

According to PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), jobs related to the technology field require level 4 mathematical proficiency. This situation leaves much to be desired in Brazil, where 70% of 15-year-old students do not go beyond level 2, considered the minimum level necessary to exercise full citizenship, recalled the president of the Sidarta Institute. “But mathematics is part of our DNA, as several academic studies have already shown. Every human being is capable of learning. The question is what we can do in education to unleash this potential.”

In the Mathematical Mindsets Program , the subject is approached from a more open, creative, and visual perspective, he pointed out. “During the Instituto Sidarta's Holiday Course, students progressed 1.3 years in their mathematical learning. And they came to believe that mistakes are part of the process.”

The importance of a good understanding of the subject for those already working in the market was highlighted by Antonio Carlos Popponzi. “From the beginning of my experience in retail, I understood how important mathematics is for managing inventory and liquidity. Today, everyone in the company where I work is trained to take care of people. In this professional development, we can see how much mathematics is lacking. Not only when administering doses or giving an injection, but also significantly in the ability to organize reasoning, send texts, divide work time, and communicate.”

In more complex applications, professionals dealing with chaos theory and artificial intelligence see mathematics as a "useful language of abstraction patterns," stated Charles Bezerra. "I don't look at challenges from the perspective of ' problem solving ,' but from the perspective of pattern logic. The lives of animals, plants, bacteria , and human beings are complex structures. And that which is complex doesn't have problems, it has patterns. Marriage and early childhood education, for example, have patterns, and what we can do is evaluate how we can influence their evolution."

To do this, it is necessary to abstract and transform data into knowledge to find advantages and solutions. "Mathematics is extremely useful for this in several dimensions. It is to science what meditation is to mysticism," concluded Charles. The webinar is available in its entirety on the Mathematical Mindsets Facebook page .