Janey

Bingo!

All, and I mean ALL of my friends, including myself who had asian/immigrant parents went to either Math tutorial or ESL classes, not just during school, but on the weekends.

I spent every Saturday morning at the Kumon centre for years. And this is during public school. As far as I know, our parents understood that the route to a respectable (interpret as high paying/professional and therefore self-sufficient) job or career was never, ever limited by having ability in mathematics.


I started Kumon in grade 3 and kept going to Grade 10. By that time, math was such an automatic thing for me, it was only through diligence that I could lower my mark (missing tests etc).


As my parents stated it, the funnel of opportunity is widest when you have all your maths and sciences, as well as your musics and languages. And you don't necessarily have to be super intelligent to do well, just disciplined and get the work done.


note: just to add a post script, being a girl, growing up in downtown Toronto, with very conservative parents, I was not allowed to go out. At All. If i wasn't involved in a school activity I was expected to be at home, either doing homework or helping with dinner etc. In the summer I was not allowed out either. the only time I could get to be doing my thing was if i was in a school club. which would explain why I joined the string orchestra. Others were in the same boat, and joined school clubs that they could get into (maybe explaining the math club memberships) based on their capabilities. the 'chinese sixpack' as they called it in Grade 13 was good for something (algebra, functions&relations, calculus, Biology, physics, chemistry)...