How I came to love Math ?A girl’s journey to Artificial Intelligence.

When someone, regardless of their gender, race or ethnicity, says that they love Math, Science or Engineering, I am intrigued to learn about the circumstances that led them to loving that field. My theory is that if we can replicate those circumstances for the next generation, we can increase the number of people that are passionate about that field.

My love for Math led me to a career in STEM. Here are the four key factors that led me to love Math,

1. Attending an all-girls school: I grew up in India and in my hometown it was common for girls to attend all-girls school and boys to attend all-boys school. From grades 5 through12, I attended an all-girls school. This meant that the best and the worst Math students (not that anyone noticed) were girls. All the teachers were women. The good Math teachers were women and the not so good Math teachers were also women. I didn’t associate ones ability in Math with gender, just like I didn’t associate ones ability in English, History or Biology with gender. To me, Math was yet another subject that one learned.
2. No preconditioning: The notion that “girls were not supposed to be good at Math” was not planted in my mind. Growing up, I did not hear from my family, friends, classmates, teachers, neighbors or on radio or on television that…