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Aboriginal students' performance in mathematics is below State and National averages at every level of schooling. The study reported here was intended to make recommendations with implications for communities, schools, teachers, teacher training organisations and policy makers (Governments) which, through improvement of the numeracy achievement of Aboriginal students, will increase the capacity of the Australian Aboriginal community to realise its potential to participate equitably in education, employment and societal privilege. Numeracy achievement was examined, using case studies conducted in schools across Australia, from two perspectives: (1) according to the identified needs of individual communities (internal measures); (2) according to external measures such as performance against National Benchmarks. Findings suggested that in schools where Aboriginal students as a group were achieving best in mathematics, this achievement was apparent according to both internal and external measures. In these schools, classroom and numeracy teaching strategies tended to be language focused and culturally inclusive/responsive. School leadership structures and whole-school culture were also culturally inclusive/responsive to the needs of Aboriginal students and their communities, which enjoyed real influence in school decision-making. These conditions appeared as a pre-requisite to success. This study suggests that the difficulty is not that teachers do not know how to teach mathematics; the difficulty is not that Aboriginal students learn mathematics differently; the difficulty appears to be in the way in which teachers, schools and organisations approach the task of enabling education for Aboriginal students. As well, the study contends that recognition of community definitions of numeracy achievement may be equally as legitimate and important as externally applied definitions.