Identifying transient and persistent issues relating to the secondary–tertiary transition and the coping mechanisms of engineering mathematics students

Abstract The secondary–tertiary transition (STT) is a significant aspect of mathematics education research as the transition from post-primary to higher education instils many feelings of anxiety in incoming students into university, even among those considered high-achieving. Following research in the 1980s and 1990s, the issues underlining the STT were identified to fall under three main themes: cognitive/epistemological, socio-cultural and didactical. There exists a wealth of literature on the STT; however, the research predominantly focuses on students entering their first year of university. This paper is a follow-up and deeper analysis of previously published conference proceedings albeit with differences in the theoretical grounding, focus and findings. In this follow-up paper, we discuss a pilot study of first-, second- and third-year undergraduate engineering students (n = 100) enrolled at an Irish university. Through survey responses, we investigate how the students’ perception of mathematics and their relationship with mathematics has evolved from their final year of secondary school, into their first year of university and throughout their university experience. We provide preliminary results indicating that issues common to the STT affect students beyond the first year of university. Moreover, we investigate the strategies students use to cope with these issues and discuss whether these coping strategies are appropriate and effective.