Whilst sipping a café in the central park of Santa Rosa de Copan, Honduras, I met a lovely 28 year old math teacher named Mariela.
Mariela was on a work trip from the capital city of Tegucigalpa, giving an introduction to “upper level” math instruction at the local university. Calculus 1 would be the climax of these talks, and Mariela had no illusions to the unfortunateness of this ceiling.
As a student, Mariela had always loved math and science. She thought at first that she would go into chemical engineering, but was driven away from it by her family and strong social pressure that suggested women were incapable of such a profession. She had to settle for a teaching degree in math, having no opportunity to study beyond two semesters of calculus.
Her daily job is teaching uninspired students uninspiring basic algebra in high school, with her jumping at any opportunity to visit small universities to teach slightly more interesting mathematics. She states with a passion her belief that her mind and heart have gone to waste, that she knows she could have done so much more.
Generally I am morally opposed to reading anything that starts: "Whilst sipping a café in the central park of Santa Rosa de Copan, Honduras, I met a lovely 28 year old math teacher named Mariela." But for you, my dear friend, anything!!
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