Journal of the Mathematics Council of the Alberta Teachers’ Association
Volume 43 Issue 2, June 2005
9
Frank Jenkins
A few years back I wrote an article for The Science Teacher indicating the critical shortage of chemistry, physics and mathematics teachers in the province (and worldwide). The typical situation was that we at the University of Alberta supplied about 75 biology majors and 12 physical science majors (a 6:1 ratio)-whereas the demand in the high schools was for a ratio of 2:3 (biology:chemistry+physics). About four years ago we graduated two chemistry teachers from the University of Alberta. Fortunately we have had a surplus of biology majors to take some of the physical science positions; however, many of these students did not even have a physical science minor.
