Math Over Mother?

This spring, our two younger daughters participated in a seminar in science and math, geared to girls.  Before we left for our hour-long drive to the host college, my husband gently warned them to watch for even subtle messages discouraging them from motherhood, in favor of a technology-based career.  We set out, fresh and enthusiastic; they were hopeful that the classes they had selected would be all they had anticipated.  I also spent the day in town, doing handwork and reading in a quiet place. 

When we met after their activity, the girls seemed eager to escape the campus.  Even before the car door closed, the first thing they wanted to talk about was the overt, anti-motherhood message.  "I was shocked," the older one blurted out, "I had expected that they would at least mask it a little!  But the very first thing they did was have us all listen to some lady tell us that her job is the most fulfilling part of her life and that her husband and children just have to understand that they are her second priority!"

The fact that the keynote speaker was not very eloquent had not enhanced her agenda with my daughters, who saw her address as too cliche to be taken seriously.  But there were likely many who still believe the lie that girls are routinely denied access to education and jobs in math and science -- and who want to believe that they will find greater satisfaction in the work-force than may be found in creating a home.  The reality is that there are many opportunities for girls who have even moderate interest in these fields, but that the most noble and fulfilling of all professions for a woman is that of a wife and mother. 

Don't misunderstand:  this is not an attack on education in general or math in particular.   We encourage our daughters (as well as our sons) to pursue their educational interests:  in addition to the educational accomplishments of our very bright sons, our oldest daughter is starting her third year of college as a math major and our second girl has been very successful in the biological sciences in high school.  Each child -- whether son or daughter -- needs to consider the impact of his decisions on his future family and choose carefully; our oldest daughter decided to go into math in an effort to bless the lives of her future children and our oldest son has abandoned his youthful dreams of a military career (or as a cowboy, riding the range,) because of the negative impact it would likely have on his future family.

Come to think of it, what is the value of math, anyway?  Contrary to the silly or thoughtless answers we sometimes give our children ("You have to do this so you'll know how to help your children when they have questions with their homework!"), math is a shorthand that helps strip away the extraneous details of our problems to exercise the logical, problem-solving part of our brains. 

In addition to the practical needs we each have for arithmetic, measuring, and estimation; math skills help us think clearly, to wade through deceit and come to decisions based on absolutes (or at least solutions effectively based on the Givens).  We all need the skills math can hone, whether our current issue is political, social, or physical -- perhaps especially mothers.  Math and motherhood should not be an "either/or" proposition:  it's not, if we put our families first.