Conference
2025 Conference
CALL for PRESENTERS: SMC Stirling Maths Conference Saturday 17th May 2025.
Have you been trying something new in your classroom that you could share with colleagues? Why not come and tell folk from across early years, primary, secondary and tertiary at the SMC conference. All are welcome.
Fill in this form by 24 March 2025: https://forms.office.com/e/iPHkKqME0E
SAVE the DATE: SMC Maths Conference Saturday 17th May 2025.
Ticket sales open from 1st April 2025. Conference fees unchanged. This conference is for all practitioners who have an interest in making things different and better for the young people in their classrooms. Come along to network with maths education geeks, and normal folk alike, and be immersed in all things mathematical.
The SMC conference is a major event in the school year, attracting many teachers with between 20 and 30 workshops on offer. It also serves as a social gathering at which teachers can meet and network with colleagues from other parts of the country.
2024 Conference
We were delighted to welcome James Grime (jamesgrime.com) as the plenary speaker of this year’s SMC conference, 
which was held at the University of Stirling on Saturday 18th May. James was an incredibly popular speaker this year, as evidenced by the number of people who queued at the end of his talk for photos and autographs!
One delegate, Andrew Norby, told us: “He is one of my mathematical heroes so getting to meet him was an honour (even though I did a poor job as his glamorous volunteer assistant for the Hamming Card trick, but he played it cool like the total pro that he is).”
We announced the recipient of the SMC Achievement Award 2024 winner, Chris Pritchard! He is pictured below with Bill Richardson MBE and Adam McBride OBE. This year, the SMC commissioned a book by previous Chair Chris Pritchard. It is anticipated that this book, On The Plus Side, will provide information and ideas for mathematics educators (and young mathematicians) across the spectrum of the Scottish school system.
There were also stalls from your favourite publishers, and a host of exciting workshops from the mathematical community. The list of workshops can be seen at https://bit.ly/SMC2024workshops and slides from several presentations can be accessed below.
2023 Conference
Almost 200 educators from the length of breadth of Scotland and Scottish Education (and, in some cases, much further afield) were present at the Scottish Mathematical Council conference at the University of Stirling on 20th May.
First order of business for the day was the announcement that Allan Duncan was the recipient of the 2023 SMC Achievement Award (see photo opposite of Allan Duncan (holding his award) and SMC Chair Alan Walker).
The keynote presentation was delivered by Ayliean MacDonald (see below). Ayliean is a former Scottish secondary mathematics teacher who has recently taken up a post as a Community Mathematician in Leeds. Her presentation, “How Maths Teachers Saved My Life”, served as a thank you to all mathematics teachers, and a session full to the brim of ideas, activities, and deep personal reflection on the wonders (and pitfalls) of teaching mathematics.
The mathematics community offered 33 workshops in a jam-packed event, and it was excellent to see such a varied offering, fit for primary teachers, secondary teachers, ITE educators and university and college lecturers.
Thanks go to all our presenters, and to the many exhibitors who came to show off the current offerings in terms of technology, pedagogy, and textbooks available to educators today.
Achievement Award
The SMC Achievement Award is presented each year at the SMC Conference. Nominations are welcome at any time.
Nominees should have been involved in mathematics education in Scotland for a significant amount of time and have made a major contribution to the learning and teaching of the subject at primary, secondary or tertiary level either through working directly with pupils or students or by holding a position of influence within a school, college, university, institute of teacher education, local authority, Education Scotland or the Inspectorate.