How Failing a Math Test Made Me A Feminist

If you ask my parents how they raised me to become such an ardent believer in equal rights and feminism they will give you this answer: We don’t know. We’re actually pretty sure we didn’t have much to do with it.

And they would be mostly right. My parents didn’t really raise me with the intention of turning me into a feminist. Neither my mother nor father ever openly identified as a feminist when I was growing up, and I doubt they would now. We didn’t talk about reproductive rights or the glass ceiling or domestic violence. Feminism never came up at the dinner table. No one was reading books about it. There was no household subscription to Ms. magazine and there were no pro-choice bumper stickers on the back of the cars. My parents just weren't openly feminist and they weren't out to make me one. Now, that’s not to say my parents didn’t raise me to believe all people were created equal, but they had no intention to make me a feminist and, in fact, I think it might have shocked them a little when I began applying that word to myself in high school.

That’s what lead my mother to ask me a few days ago where all of these beliefs came from which got me thinking about my "click" moment, that minute when it all started. Eventually I reached a pretty obvious realization. If it hadn't been my family, it had to have been my teachers. Of course, when I reported this discovery my mom assumed that meant my women’s studies teacher in high school, but by the time she had me in class I already believed in feminism. She didn’t teach me the beliefs and principles; she just gave me the words for it and allowed me to own and embrace my feminism while fleshing out my exact beliefs on different issues.

So I thought back a little further in my education. If by high school I was already identifying as a feminist, then that meant it must have started in middle school or even elementary school. I examined my memories of middle school, but nothing stood out. Even then I think I was already a feminist despite not having labeled it yet.

That left elementary school. Finally, a memory jumped out. Fourth grade. I had consistently been the smartest girl in the class. Actually I tended to be the smartest person out of the boys and girls. And that was a problem for fourth grade me. After being the only person to get straight As for two quarters I was starting to feel the pressure to be “normal.” My classmates thought I was weird and I knew it. Everyone knew girls weren’t supposed to be the smart ones and they definitely weren't supposed to be good at math! Sure, my classmates told me I was smart, but they also told me I was a freak, I was unusual so I did what any fourth grader would do. I deliberately failed a math test. And, then, I failed another. That was all it took to get a B and just one was enough for me. That was all I needed. Suddenly I was like everyone else and I wasn’t beating the boys anymore. I had done it. I had achieved my goals! I was normal!

Unfortunately, I was fooling no one, least of all my math teacher, Mrs. Schulter. It didn’t take her long to figure things out. She’d seen girls with my MO before and she wouldn’t stand for it. It only took one B for her to sit me down and tell me I was better than that and that she could see right through my act. And because she terrified me like no other teacher before or since, it worked. I shaped up and was back to straight As in no time.

That was all it took to make me a feminist: One woman telling young, impressionable me that I was allowed to be the smartest person in a room even if I was a girl. There was nothing wrong with me being smart; there was something wrong with the people telling me that was bad. That was it. From that moment on I realized I could be what I wanted to be and I could be the best at it. And what I wanted was to equal to the boys. I’ve never stopped wanting it and I’ve never stopped fighting for it.

So, thank you, Mrs. Schulter, the most terrifying woman I’ve ever met, for allowing me to be the best and for making me a feminist, whether you meant to or not.