( BPRW) This Pi Day Let’s Celebrate The First Black Woman To Earn Her PhD In MathematicsIn 1943, Martha Euphemia Lofton Haynes graduated from the Catholic University of America with her PhD in mathematics. ( Black PR Wire ) Every year, Pi Day is celebrated on March 14. It’s the celebration of the mathematical sign pi, and the date is symbolic because ( 3.14 ) signifies the first three digits of pi. This year Turn is celebrating by honoring Martha Euphemia Lofton Hayes, the second Black woman to gain a PhD in Mathematics. Haynes was born on September 11, 1890, in Washington, D. C., only 25 years after the Civil War had ended. Haynes preferred to go by her thick brand, Euphemia, as opposed to Martha. Her family worked as a school teacher, and her father, William Lofton, was a physician. Lofton “was a part of the Washington ‘ Black 400,’ a tiny cluster of fewer than one hundred people in Washington, D. C., who were considered aristocrats of colour”, according to American Mathematical Society. The 1900 census shows that by the day she was nine, Haynes was residing in her uncle and uncle’s house along with her mother, great-grandmother, nephew, and niece. According to archive information, despite some home struggles, they remained close. In 1907, Haynes graduated from M Street higher class. During her valedictorian speech, she stated” For a person of intelligence is well equipped to solve the problems of life… We must have some defined aim in life and be able to fill competently that position in which we may find ourselves…Let each defeat be a source of a new endeavor and each victory the strengthening of our spirit of gratitude and charity towards the unsuccessful” .Haynes words would be predictive of her future accomplishments. Two years later, she graduated from Miner Normal School in 1909 and then from Smith College, with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics in 1914. For Haynes, the time 1930 was exciting. She earned a master’s degree in education from the University of Chicago. ” Her essay studied the difficulty of testing in helping understand the causes and deviations in student results”. Haynes ‘ research “discussed the impulses to determine student progress as opposed to just defining students”. ” That same year, she founded the mathematics section at Miner Teachers College ( eventually renamed the University of the District of Columbia ), which focused on teaching African-American educators”. In contrast, Haynes even became a Miner Teachers College teacher in 1930, and she would keep her article as head of the mathematics section there for almost 30 years. On top of her many efforts, Haynes continued to pursue her calculus studies. In 1943, Haynes made history when she graduated from Catholic University of America ( CUA) with her doctorate degree in mathematics becoming the first Black woman to earn her PhD. Her dissertation under the supervision of Professor Aubrey Edward Landry was entitled,” The Determination of Sets of Independent Conditions Characterizing Certain Special Cases of Symmetric Correspondences” .Subsequently, Haynes continued teaching math at numerous public high schools in Washington, D. C. and continuing to serve as a college professor. Haynes became a member of the D. C. class committee in 1960. Three years later, she spoke out against the use of IQ tests, drawing on the work of her master’s thesis, which was “central to her advocacy in desegregating DC Public Schools and ending the system of tracking, a system that placed African-American students on one path ( academic or vocational )” .By 1965, administrators, educational experts, and parents successfully petitioned the school system, which led to an investigation which found evidence of discrimination: “most students on the honors track were white and students on the basic track were Black”. A year later, after Dr. Haynes won her vote, becoming president of the school board, she “immediately dismantled the tracking system, replacing it with new classroom methods of analysis “.The excellent advocate, tutor, and scientist died at 90, having paved the way for potential Black people in STEM. In 2018, 75 years after Haynes received her doctorate degree, CUA established the Euphemia Lofton Haynes Award, which is awarded” to a junior mathematics major who has demonstrated excellence and promise in their study of mathematics” .Source: ESSENCE.com
(BPRW) This Pi Day Let’s Celebrate The First Black Woman To Earn Her PhD In Mathematics
