Defending My DaughterMy daughter, Tina, locked herself in her room, crying so hard her body shook.
I pried the door open and saw that she was clutching a test paper that was torn to shreds and pieced back together.
It was a math Olympiad selection test. She should have gotten a perfect score, but was given a score of zero instead.
"Mom," she sobbed, "the teacher said 3x5 is not equal to 5x3; that it's taking shortcuts. She tore my paper up in front of everyone, revoked my eligibility for the competition, and told the whole class not to talk to me…"
I looked at the deep red scratch marks on my daughter's wrist and immediately picked up the phone to call the principal.
"What good does it do for your school's reputation to drive a kid who loves math to their breaking point?"