Resumen de Bridging the mathematics gap between the engineering classroom and the workplace

Pierre Vincent Quéré

• Teaching mathematics to future engineers while keeping up with real-world scientific evolutions is a challenge with diverse constraints and difficulties. In this article, I present and analyze the design and implementation of a Study and Research Path (SRP) in a statistics class in a French chemical engineering school. An SRP is a projectbased learning approach and part of the Anthropological Theory of the Didactic (ATD), the theory framing my study. In terms of data collection strategies, my research draws on observation of the SRP and on diverse monitoring tools (questionnaires, interviews, a diary, etc.). Moreover, I use the concept of mathematical praxeologies to analyze the mathematical activity that the future chemical engineers develop during the SRP and to compare the praxeologies met in the SRP with the usual praxeologies met in the workplace. The similarities observed reveal that such an SRP can contribute to bridging the gap between the engineering school and the workplace. I identify and discuss factors and conditions that played an important role in the design and implementation of the SRP.