Every cloud has a silver lining. The credit crunch and the collapse of major international banking businesses are seen as an opportunity to recruit bankers into maths teaching. Ofsted informs us that the quality of maths teaching is not good enough, so the solution then is obvious to the Training and Development Agency for Schools. We employ those high-flyers from the workforce that recklessly lends money, uses dodgy, if legal, methods almost to bankrupt a major UK bank and who bet on market movements, often losing billions of pounds. Looks like the next generation are in for some interesting maths lessons.

James D Williams, Lecturer in science education, University of Sussex, Brighton.