How has your culture/ethnicity impacted who you are today?

 I consider myself very lucky to have grown up on the outskirts of a major city. Growing up in south-suburban Chicago meant that I grew up in the cultural and ethnic majority, but also met people from all different backgrounds. Segregation is very apparent driving into the city from the south. I was always aware of the vast disparities in the quality of education between white communities and minority communities. I’m lucky that my family taught me to appreciate the opportunities I was born into and advocate for those who don’t have equal access. These are just a few of the reasons I chose to join Teach For America after college.

 It’s hard to understand minority experience until you yourself are a minority. I experienced this for the first time in my upper-level mathematics courses in college. I remember the first time I really looked around a classroom and saw that I was one of two women in the room. It was the first time I felt that isolating feeling despite the university being incredibly supportive of women in STEM fields. I never experienced any sort of negative comments from other students, and I never felt stereotyped or threatened. However, I did feel different and that wasn’t a great feeling. That is the reason I work to encourage women to study upper-level mathematics. I like teaching challenging courses to show young girls that men are not inherently better at math than woman.

 To summarize, I’ve lived with the privilege of being in the cultural and ethnic majority. It’s my identity as a woman that has most shaped who I am today.

Choose one student or acquaintance who is ethnically different from the mainstream culture (This may also include a student in your class). Explain how you think that person’s culture has impacted his/her self-esteem and/or life choices.

 It’s hard for me to choose a student to talk about for this because in high school most students haven’t made any major life choices yet. However, in regards to self-esteem one student comes to mind that I taught in Chicago. She was a quiet student who was struggling on her first several assignments in math. She was Hispanic but not a minority at the school (demographic of the school was about 50% Hispanic and 50% African-American). What I learned from meeting with her one-on-one is that she was embarrassed to talk in class because her accent was heavier than the other students. Her family had only immigrated to the United States in the last few years and her parents spoke exclusively Spanish at home. I was able to help her be successful by meeting with her individually more frequently so she could ask questions directly.

 This is an example of why I’m excited to be enrolled in his program. Although at my current school I haven’t had a student in my class that is an English Learner. I’ve never had any sort of training with helping these students. I can certainly understand why this would impact a child’s self-esteem and that child might be misunderstood as not grasping the math concepts.