I’ll be a scientist, thank you

I realize life has changed somewhat since my school days and situations like mine aren’t very common right now. Still, I see society turning away from education and science and have to wonder if someday my grandkids will be telling a story just like this.

I blew a lot of the stereotypes when I was in elementary school, violating two basic principles: everyone knows that girls aren’t as good as boys in maths and everyone knows no one can be good at both maths and language.

So, when we had a school-wide math test when I was 10 and I won the top marks, the first thought was that I had cheated. In the interest of “fairness”, I was given the chance to retake the test. This time it was just me, an empty library and a teacher watching me. I still gained top marks. The school board simply could not accept this result and my award was taken away on the grounds that I had still somehow cheated, even though they weren’t able to prove how.

I was very fortunate that year, though, in that I had a teacher who not only recognised my ability in maths, but also interest. He took time out of his schedule (lunches and after class) to give me private lessons. I was not able to tell anyone that he was doing this; he heard for his job. Not because he was alone with a young girl, but because he was teaching me maths.

I am a civil engineer now and speak (with varying levels of fluency) about 20 languages. I blame it all on that one teacher I had. Thank you, Mr Cox. I owe it all to you.