School Mathematics Project

The School Mathematics Project is a developer of mathematics textbooks for secondary schools, based in Southampton in the UK.

Now generally known as SMP, it began as a research project inspired by a 1961 conference chaired by Bryan Thwaites at the University of Southampton, which itself was precipitated by calls to reform mathematics teaching in the wake of the Sputnik launch by the Soviet Union, the same circumstances which prompted the wider New Math movement. It maintains close ties with the Collaborative Group for Research in Mathematics Education at the university.

Instead of dwelling on 'traditional' areas such as arithmetic and geometry, SMP dwelt on subjects such as set theory, graph theory and logic, non-cartesian co-ordinate systems, matrix mathematics, affine transforms, vectors and non-decimal number systems.

The SMP is now a registered charity, and continues to publish textbooks in association with Cambridge University Press for GCSE and both AQA and Edexcel A-level exams. It also publishes an educational comic called "Mathematical Mike and his Dog Dingle."

The computer paper tape motif on early educational material reads "THE SCHOOL MATHEMATICS PROJECT DIRECTED BY BRYAN THWAITES".

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