Buzzfeed:
Danica McKellar, former Wonder Years star, is on a mission to make young women know they’re just as good at math as their male counterparts.
She just released her fourth math book for girls, Girls Get Curves. It’s designed to teach girls math but also confidence so that they don’t shy away from pursuing it in college or their careers beyond. Playing off the geometry focus, the book also tries to teach young women how to have a positive body image in a world that tries to keep them from it. McKellar speaks to BuzzFeed Shift about why women are so underrepresented in mathematics, her own experiences in the field, and more.
Winnie has growed up real good and, after graduating summa cum laude from UCLA with a degree in Mathematics, has made another career for herself as an award winning author and mathematician.
I still have the same crush on her as when I was a kid watching ‘The Wonder Years’.
Nice. A bit “Rah Rah” ish but the intent is good. The problem is women that I see often make a decision early on in life. Some become pre-occupied with their looks and other focus on education (I realize they are not mutually exclusive). Some women neatly balance style and smarts (a fave of mine being Jennifer Connelly)
The problem becomes one of peer pressure. Even on the cover of this book McKellar is wearing a somewhat provocative outfit. There is constant pressure for women to work on the outside first.
Once we give women as much credit (or more) for their intelligence rather than where they measure up on the “Hot or Not” scale we’ll have knocked down a significant barrier.
McKellar has been doing some very praiseworthy work, and giving great interviews on NPR’s Science Friday and Nerdist to describe it. She’s aware of how oppressive gender roles can be, and is subverting them in a way that I believe communicates effectively.
The world would be a better place with more people with more Danica McKellars.
I would commend this book to all future mothers and make it mandatory reading for any mother entering her daughter in “beauty pageants.”