Dr. Andrew A. Hunte is the Head of the School of Humanities and Education at UWI Five Islands Campus, Antigua and Barbuda. He lectures courses in Mathematics and Education. Dr. Hunte holds a doctoral degree in Curriculum and Instruction of Mathematics and an MSc in Mathematics from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign(UIUC). Dr Hunte also holds an MPhil in Graph Theory and Combinatorics and a BSc in Mathematics from the University of the West Indies.
Dr. Hunte is a Fulbright scholar and serves as an Assistant Chief Examiner of Additional Mathematics (CSEC) at the Caribbean Examination Council. He also serves as an Associate Editor of the Caribbean Educational Research Journal (CERJ) based at UWI Cave Hill Campus. Dr. Hunte is the chairman of the Board of Governors of the National Institute of Higher Education, Research, Science and Technology (NIHERST) for the government of Trinidad and Tobago.
Dr Hunte’s research interests include mathematics education reform, geometric and algebraic thinking, reasoning and proof in mathematics and quality assurance practices in higher education. Dr. Hunte has over 22 years’ experience teaching at the tertiary level in the US, Trinidad and Tobago and Antigua and Barbuda. Dr. Hunte has presented his work at several international mathematics education conferences such as Psychology of Mathematics Education North American Chapter(PMENA), International Congress of Mathematics Education(ICME) and the American Education Researchers Association (AERA). Dr. Hunte has received several international awards for his research and excellence in teaching.
Poster Description
“Educational Stakeholders’ Perspectives about Entrepreneurship education in the Primary School Curriculum in Antigua and Barbuda“
In Antigua and Barbuda, as in many other countries, there is a growing recognition of the importance of entrepreneurship education in developing students’ skills and abilities to succeed in the 21st-century workforce, within a rapidly changing global economy. To ensure the successful implementation of entrepreneurship education in primary schools, it is important to gather the perspectives of key educational stakeholders such as teachers and administrators. This study explored the views and opinions of educators and educational officials on the inclusion of entrepreneurship education in the primary school curriculum in Antigua and Barbuda. The research was conducted in seven public primary schools within one educational district, with a sample of 56 instructors and 11 educational administrators, which included school principals and curriculum officers at the Ministry of Education. The researchers collected data through questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Data analysis included descriptive statistics and thematic content analysis of interview transcripts . The findings suggest that although opinions on the implementation of entrepreneurship education differ, the participants collectively agreed on its potential to foster critical thinking and problem-solving skills, promote creativity, and encourage social responsibility. Overall, this study highlights the importance of entrepreneurship education in Antigua and Barbuda and provides valuable insights for future policies and academic research on the topic in the Caribbean, where limited research has been conducted. Further studies could explore the impact of entrepreneurship education on developing 21st-century skills at all educational levels, and help to ensure that students are well-equipped and thrive within the 4th Industrial revolution.
Session Description
Throughout the Caribbean educational territories, reform-oriented curricula highlight the intellectual need of reasoning and proof in students’ mathematical development. In this narrative study, we documented teachers and their students’ journey as they engaged in the processes of reasoning and proof during a unit of secondary school geometry lessons. Through classroom observations and pre and post-observation interviews with the teachers and their students, we examined the social mathematical norms and classroom practices that facilitated students’ learning experiences with reasoning and proof. We also determined whether the instructional practices aligned with reformers’ recommendations. Our analysis of the data indicated that the teachers exhibited reform-oriented practices by establishing social mathematical norms that led to discussions about mathematical content during each process of reasoning and proof.
The students progressed from identifying patterns through conjecturing and then argumentation, ultimately leading to their learning and proving congruency of triangles. The teachers also incorporated cultural artifacts framed in an ethnomathematical lens to engage students in the mathematics lessons. Moreover, we noted the teacher’s incorporation of the Geometric Calculation with Number and Explanation (GCNE) (Hunte, 2018) questions at the final stage in the processes of reasoning and proof. This study provides the much-needed documented evidence of classroom practices that align with reformers recommendations for the teaching of reasoning and proof. Furthermore, the classroom practices fostered students’ development of critical thinking abilities, problem-solving skills, and a conceptual understanding of mathematics that is essential for success in higher education and in the workplace.