Plus appears on Doctor Who!

Whatever you're planning to do this Saturday (April 29) evening at 7.20pm, cancel it! Instead, tune into Doctor Who on BBC One, keep your eyes peeled closely to the screen and you'll spot something very familiar: the Plus career posters!

As The Doctor has proved countless times, brains are the name of the game when it comes to polishing off your rivals. And since brains are in abundant supply in the heads of superbright maths students, this Saturday's episode, entitled School reunion, finds The Doctor in a London school. On his arrival he meets strange bat-like beings, some mysterious new teachers, an old friend, the Plus posters ... and finds out that a little maths in the wrong heads can be a dangerous thing.

Plus is extremely proud of the appearance of its posters on Doctor Who! The posters were launched in 2004 in order to showcase the wide range of careers open to people with a background in maths. As regular Plus readers will know, each issue of Plus features an interview with someone who has a maths or maths-related degree, and our careers library is proof of the amazing range of possibilities open to mathematicians: from avalanche researcher to audio software engineer, almost every field you can think of is represented here. The posters, each with its own title and theme, are intended to spread this message and to be a resource for teachers and career advisors dealing with mathematically-minded students.

The posters are part of our effort to reverse the negative image of maths which unfortunately still prevails in the UK and which has caused a worrying decline in the numbers of students taking maths at A level or university. The posters have proved a great success ever since their launch, generating excellent feedback from teachers, parents and students, and with continuing requests to send out more. They are available free of charge, so if you would like to order your own copy, whether it's for your school, university or just for the pleasure of owning one, then write to us including an SAE in your letter.

Appearing on Doctor Who is a great compliment to our posters and to our graphic designer Charles Trevelyan. With The Doctor's help, maths fame will surely spread throughout the TV-viewing world and beyond, reaching intelligent civilisations of all ages and dimensions. But then, if they're intelligent they probably already got the message.

The epsiode will be aired on Saturday 29th of April at 7.20 pm on BBC One and on Sunday 30th April at 7pm on BBC Three.

Further reading

• You can watch the episode's trailer on the BBC website.
• The Plus posters are not the only maths posters that achieved wider fame: a similar range of posters produced by the Newton Institute featured on Dawson's Creek in 2001 and won the Merit level Heist award for excellence in an educational marketing campaign. Find out more in the Plus article Maths on the tube.