Mr Spencer, who is also a mathematics and science ambassador for the University of Sydney, is a comedian, television personality and has been a breakfast radio announcer on Triple J and ABC Sydney. 

But at Charles Sturt University’s Bathurst campus he was all about numbers and puzzles, “preaching the gospel of mathematics” to students from Orange High School and Canobolas Rural Technology High School.

“For kids like this, getting outside the normal curriculum and pushing themselves normally excites them,” he said.

“We need a new generation of young, smart, mathematical-minded kids to take on the jobs like encoding algorithms for jobs that haven’t been invented yet to sustain this country.

“If you’ve got mathematical talent, you’ve got to use it to stay in the mathematical sciences. We’ve got to stop using maths to get great marks and then go into law or other things. Maths for maths.”

Students were challenged in various problems. 

“Some are simple maths problems that are a century old and others are ones that I’ve designed for my latest book that no students have tried before,” he said.

“Problem solving and getting the kids together with other people they’ve never met and getting them to work their heads around different ways of thinking.”

Students also came from Bathurst’s Kelso High and MacKillop College, as well as Crookwell and Goulburn.