"Lecturer in Mathematical Cognition"

The Centre for Mathematical Cognition (CMC) is one of the largest groups of mathematical cognition researchers in the world. Established in 2020, we used a £7.2m ‘Expanding Excellence in England’ grant from Research England to recruit a team of high-quality academics and invest in world-class facilities. In 2022, we led a successful £9.8m application to host the five-year ESRC Centre for Early Mathematics Learning (CEML). The CEML is the largest research project on early mathematics learning ever funded by UK Research and Innovation: it involves 19 academics (10 based in the CMC) and 14 research and professional services staff (all based in the CMC). The CMC also has a vibrant community of doctoral researchers, funded via a range of sources including the Midlands Graduate School ESRC Doctoral Training Partnership.

The CMC views mathematical cognition as a fundamentally interdisciplinary endeavour. Colleagues bring expertise in cognitive psychology, developmental psychology, mathematics education, educational design, neuroscience, mathematics, educational evaluation, metascience and the philosophy of mathematical practice. To influence educational practice, we partner with a wide range of regional, national and international organisations. We coordinate the Loughborough University Mathematics Education Network (LUMEN) – a regional collaboration of schools and teachers – and in 2024 we launched the LUMEN mathematics curriculum, a fully resourced and evidence-based curriculum for secondary. This and other examples of our work can be found on the Centre’s website.

Organisationally, the CMC sits within Loughborough’s Department of Mathematics Education. Colleagues develop and teach core and specialised modules on the university’s successful undergraduate programmes in psychology and mathematics; we also contribute to teaching statistics across the campus, and to an interdisciplinary masters programme.

The CMC’s current strategic priorities are to increase our capacity for research on:

• The cognitive foundations of early mathematics;
• Individual differences in mathematics learning, particularly dyscalculia, mathematics anxiety and health and clinical factors such as premature birth and ageing;
• Mathematical thinking and reasoning across development;
• Translation to practice and policy, using insights from basic science to improve education;
• Educational evaluation and the communication of research findings.

We seek to appoint excellent Lecturers or Senior Lecturers (equivalent to Assistant Professor or Associate Professor) who share our interdisciplinary view of mathematical cognition, who are able to advance our teaching activities, and who wish to contribute to our vibrant research culture. To find out more about our work and facilities, please visit the CMC website or the CEML website, or contact Ian Jones.

For more information refer to the Job Description and Person Specification.