Despite or perhaps because of the introduction of top-up fees attracting students to study mathematics at university seems to be getting easier while sending them out at the other end has never been difficult: the tricky time is the bit in between. With ‘A’ level grade inflation comes the increasingly difficult task of identifying which students are in need of additional support particularly the timing of any necessary remedial intervention and clearly both the student and the university benefit from improvements in retention rates. In this article performances are examined for various stages from ‘A’ level through to degree classification for recent cohorts of mathematics students at the University of Reading since the introduction of curriculum 2000 with the purpose of identifying any trends including possible correlation between ‘A’ level results diagnostic tests on entry and subsequent performances and to see if these are sufficient indicators to permit early targeting of students needing additional support. The discussion concludes with an example of how the statistics can be used in anger to set personal attainment targets for students which was prevalent throughout their schooling with a view to improving achievement. The statistics can also help to provide applicants with realistic predictions of possible attainment levels bringing the process full circle as this can lead to opportunities to improve even further recruitment to mathematics programmes.
