Two anniversaries

Abstract

It is just twenty years ago that sixty school teachers (mostly heads of mathematics departments) and twenty representatives of industry spent ten days together at Trinity College, Oxford for an intensive exchange of information and ideas. They had as their theme the changes that had been taking place in the uses of mathematics, and their relevance for school teaching. The conference was a seminal one in the development of British mathematical education; it made important personal contacts, it widened horizons, and it could also be described as the great-grandfather of SMP (the grandfather and father being the conferences which followed in 1959 and 1961 at Liverpool and Southampton). With the emphasis nowadays on the importance of keeping school mathematics in touch with the needs of industry, it is germane to remind ourselves of the influence which industrialists have exercised—personally, financially and mathematically—on the development and dissemination of new curricula in this country. Members of our Association may not always appreciate the contribution of its Schools and Industry Committee in keeping the dialogue going.