Please note that this STEP Support Programme website will be unavailable for a short period today, Wednesday 9th November, between about 5.30 and 6.30 pm, while the Faculty of Mathematics carries out some web server maintenance.

Sorry for any inconvenience - it should hopefully only be a short downtime.

There is an article in the NRICH website called the why and how of substitution. In it they give a few examples of how to simplify difficult expressions. But I don't understand how they simplified example 5, which is a polynomial to the power n, and example 6 which is the formula of conic.

Please help!

Assignment 9 is now available.

I have also inserted links to websites where you can read further about some of the topics and ideas introduced in the assignments for all the previous assignments, so you may like to revisit them!

Assignment 8 is now published and ready.

The "hints and partial solutions" for all the assignments have been updated (and now include some answers). Please let us know if you find a mistake!

My background is I did a Pure Mathematics degree a long time ago - and I've taught it off and on for about twenty years.

I would just like to say how much I am enjoying the Assignments.

I think the whole series (including "bonus content") is very well designed. It's a real mathematical education, pitched at just the right level for someone interested in the subject and thinking of studying it at university.

Keep up the good work.

Concerning question 2 i, why do the hints and partial solutions say that the answer for the number of rearrangments for Charlie are 5! and not 7! ?

Assignment 7 is now available (sorry for the delay!).

We are now making "hints and partial solutions" available at the same time as the assignment - we suggest that you work through the assignment first, but the hints are there if you get stuck and you can use the answers to check your work. You can still (of course) post on here!

Hello guys,

I'm in lower sixth this year. I've done 6 alevel modules last year and am expecting to try step 2&3 at the end of this year. Anyone knows whether I can retake it next year if I don't get satisfactory results or it's an one-off exam?

Hi - these two are now published. Do please use the forum if you have any questions on any of the assignments.

Question 4ii on Assignment 6 is an interesting one - it shows that, even when you have a "very accurate" blood test, the chances of you having a disease if you test positive for it can be quite low.

Have fun!