Math Is My Enemy by David

Math Is My Enemy by David - July 2023 Scholarship Essay

“What is so hard to understand David, are you stupid or something?!” That is what someone said to me during my sophomore year of high school during my math class. I was told that math is a universal language and that you could understand it no matter what language you spoke. You could find universal truths with math, so why did it feel like I was listening to Mandarin while I spoke French?

I remember a time when I liked math, it was middle school. I understood math and enjoyed the process of solving equations and would even help my classmates and my teachers with lessons. I was confident in my skills until I go to my sophomore year. That was the year math became my enemy. I was introduced to new topics that were more challenging and I was struggling to grasp the concepts I was learning. I immediately fell behind and got stuck in a loop of just beginning to understand a topic while my peers were two or three topics ahead. Needless to say, I was defeated. The biggest gut punch at the time was when I had to take my PSAT and an entrance exam to attend a middle college program. I was stellar when it came to science and English, but math was a different beast. I failed both. Not only did I lose the best and most straightforward way of attending college virtually debt free, I had one of the lowest PSAT scores in my class that year. I was ashamed and hid my score.

Sophomore year was the year I discovered what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to become a software engineer. I took a Python programming class and fell in love. I was loving tackling different problems again. It was a feeling I was missing. I talked to my counselors about me majoring in computer science and they were ecstatic. Then they told me about how much math would be required and I felt sick to my stomach. They knew how weak I was in math, they could see my grades after all. That didn’t stop them from encouraging me to put the work in. I knew this was something I was serious about so I decided to go all in. I got extra help from my teachers and started to grasp the concepts and fill the gaps in my understanding.

I got accepted into the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, my dream school. I never felt so accomplished. I started my degree but the transition to college was rough, I worked through it to pass my first semester’s classes. Unfortunately for me, because I got a 26 on my ACT, I was not ready for Calculus 1 and 2 in my first year. I had to take precalc this summer. I struggled at first but after getting some help and practicing day and night, I passed my class with 96%. This showed me that I could truly work through my struggles and address my shortcomings. I am now preparing to take Calculus 1 this fall and while it seems daunting, I am taking it head-on!