Two Catholic high school students in New Orleans, Louisiana, used trigonometry to solve a mathematical puzzle that was thought to be unsolvable for 2,000 years.
At St. Mary’s Academy, an all-girls school founded by nuns to help other young black women after the Civil War, Calthea Johnson and Nekiya Jackson are challenged to enter a math contest for a $500 prize. It was done.
The two seniors completed the quiz and began the difficult bonus test of creating a new proof of the Pythagorean theorem.
This theorem is best known as a fundamental principle of geometry and shows how you can calculate the length of one side of a right triangle if you know the lengths of the other two triangles.
Both girls were studying geometry and trigonometry. Said CBS News reports it wasn’t easy.
The outlet reported:
What no one told them was that while there have been over 300 documented proofs of the Pythagorean theorem using algebra and geometry, for 2,000 years they thought it impossible to prove it using trigonometry. And that was the additional question they faced.
When CBS interviewer Bill Whitaker asked the two students if they thought about the difficulty of the problem, Nekiya replied, “Yes.” But would that have stopped them? no.
“I started something, and I need to finish it,” Calcea said. “Because I was like, ‘$500 is a lot of money.’ So I — I’m willing to at least give it a shot.”
The bonus question was asked in December 2022, and the girls spent almost all of their free time on it over the next two months.
Calcea’s parents, Cal and CeCe Johnson, recalled how eager their daughter was to solve frustrating puzzles.
“She was like, ‘Mom, this is a little too much,'” CeCe told the magazine. “So I started looking into what she actually does. And for this one issue of hers, she took pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages and pages that she’s doing, she’s taking over 30 pages. Ta.”
“Yes, the trash can was full of papers. She would use them to solve problems, and if that didn’t work, she would roll them up and throw them in the trash,” Cal added.
When Whittaker asked Nekiya’s mother if she had thought of the matter herself, she laughed.
“Personally, it wasn’t like that,” Neriska Jackson said. “Because most of the time, she doesn’t understand what she’s doing.”
Michelle Blouin Williams is the math teacher who originally assigned this assignment.
“Did you think someone would fix it?” Whittaker asked.
“Well, I wasn’t necessarily looking for a solution. So, no, I wasn’t,” she replied.
When asked what exactly he was looking for, Williams said, “Ingenuity.”
Well, Calcea and Nekiya certainly achieved that. The two girls independently came up with a proof using only trigonometry.
The only theorem proof using this method was done by mathematician Dr. Jason Zimba in 2009, which is the only one in 2,000 years.
“So you guys are math geniuses?” Whittaker asked.
“I think that’s an overstatement,” Calcea said.
“You’re really good at math, if not a genius,” the interviewer said.
“Absolutely not,” Nekiya said with a laugh.
The girls’ teachers will present their proof to the American Mathematical Association’s March 2023 conference in Atlanta, Georgia.
“So the teacher came up to us and said, ‘Hey, maybe we can actually present this.’ I was like, ‘Are you kidding me?’ But she wasn’t,” Ne’Kiya recalled. “So, off I went. I stood there. We gave a presentation, it went well, and then it blew up.”
Calcea described the massive response to their accomplishments as “insane, unexpected” and “crazy.”
They were celebrated not only by family members, teachers and colleagues, but also by very prominent figures.
After the presentation, former first lady Michelle Obama encouraged the students: “I’m rooting for you and can’t wait to see what you do next.”
I love this story about two at-risk high school students, Calthea Johnson and Nekiya Jackson.
Contributor michelle obama upon Friday, March 31, 2023
They also received recognition from then-Louisiana Governor. John Bel Edwards and the iconic key to the city of New Orleans.
“Why do you think so many people found your actions impressive?” Whittaker asked.
Ne’Kiya said she received a lot of attention because of her race, gender and age, but she wanted to be accepted “for who she is.”
“I actually want to be praised for what it is, like that it’s a great mathematical achievement,” she told an interviewer.
Calthea and Nekiya are smart and hardworking, but typical St. Mary’s students, according to their math teacher.
“They’re not unicorns,” Whittaker posed.
“Oh, no, no. If they were unicorns, every woman who enrolled in this school would be a beautiful black unicorn,” Williams said.
Principal Pamela Rogers said the school has had a 100 percent graduation and college acceptance rate for the past 17 years.
The school, which has around 600 students, achieves this through strict rules and high expectations.
CBS reported, “At St. Mary’s University, half of the students receive scholarships through a fundraising effort to cover the annual $8,000 tuition.” “There are no exams to get in here, but expectations are high and rules are strict: no cell phones, skirts modest and hair must be a natural color.”
When it comes to the accomplishments of Ne’Kiya and Calcea after they graduate in 2023, both continue to perform well.
Nekiya drove to Xavier University School of Pharmacy in New Orleans, and Calcea, valedictorian, studied environmental engineering at Louisiana State University.
“So, wait a minute. Neither of you intend to pursue a career in mathematics?” Whittaker asked.
Both young women said “no” and laughed.
“I might minor in math, but I don’t want to make it my career,” Calcea said.
“Well, if I become a mathematician, people might expect too much from me,” Ne’Kiya added.
However, I am not completely done with mathematics. After finding the first evidence, they accomplished much more.
“We found five, and at least five more common forms that could potentially generate additional evidence,” Calcea said.
“So you guys aren’t math geniuses?” Whittaker asked again.
Both men insisted that they were not just hard workers.
