Katherine Johnson validated, reflected my career
I wanted to be a scientist since I was a child. There was a television show in the 1980s called “3-2-1 Contact.”
It featured an African American girl, and when I saw her doing math and science, I saw myself.
A picture can change the course of one’s life, and after that, childhood images of black women in science via any media outlet were rare. In fact, it wasn’t until the movie “Hidden Figures” that I saw black women scientists and mathematicians in media again.
When I, as an adult, saw black women walking through the halls of NASA on the movie screen, I cried.
Katherine Johnson, whose life was told in the film and who passed away this week, was an American hero. Not just because she was a woman in science and mathematics, but because she served as a reflection for countless people. She was proof to students who did not see their likeness that science was their rightful place. She will continue to touch many lives.
I have come to know the importance of reflections not only from the media, but also from my career in science. I went on to become a professor in engineering at an Ivy League institution.
I eventually left the academy to work full time as a science public speaker, where in this capacity I can show all students that science is for them and I can be a reflection.
In my talks, I often tell students stories about women and people of color who had been hidden in the sciences, much like Johnson once was. Johnson has left a great legacy, beyond mathematical solutions. She has not only brought us closer to the stars, but, by her example, she also showed many of us to shoot for them.
Ainissa Ramirez New Haven, Conn.