Paloma Noyola: The Face of Mexico’s Unleashed Potential
When a report emerged in September 2012 that a girl from one of Matamoros’ poorest neighborhoods had attained the highest math score in Mexico, some doubted its veracity. It must be fake, they said.
But it wasn’t fake. Her name is Paloma Noyola, and what most reports failed to mention is that almost all of her classmates also scored very high on the national math test. 10 scored in 99.99% percentile.
Paloma and her classmates also scored in the top percentile in language. Something special was happening at José Urbina López primary school in Matamoros, and Wired went to take a look.
The high test scores turned out to be the work of a young teacher who also came from humble beginnings. Sergio Juárez Correa was tired of the monotony of teaching out of a book and wanted to try something new to help engage his students when he came across the work of Sugata Mitra, a UK university professor who had innovated a new pedagogy he called SOLE, or self organized learning environments. The new approach paid off.
Although SOLE usually relies on unfettered Internet access for research, Juárez and his students had very limited access. Somehow, he still found a way to apply Mitra’s teachings and unleash their potential.
From the beginning, Paloma’s exceptional abilities were evident:
One day Juárez Correa went to his whiteboard and wrote “1 = 1.00.” Normally, at this point, he would start explaining the concept of fractions and decimals. Instead he just wrote “½ = ?” and “¼ = ?”
“Think about that for a second,” he said, and walked out of the room.
While the kids murmured, Juárez Correa went to the school cafeteria, where children could buy breakfast and lunch for small change. He borrowed about 10 pesos in coins, worth about 75 cents, and walked back to his classroom, where he distributed a peso’s worth of coins to each table. He noticed that Paloma had already written .50 and .25 on a piece of paper.
As Mr. Juárez implemented more of Mitra’s teachings in his classroom, Paloma continued to stand out as an exceptionally gifted student:
Juárez Correa was impressed. But he was even more intrigued by Paloma. During these experiments, he noticed that she almost always came up with the answer immediately. Sometimes she explained things to her tablemates, other times she kept the answer to herself. Nobody had told him that she had an unusual gift. Yet even when he gave the class difficult questions, she quickly jotted down the answers. To test her limits, he challenged the class with a problem he was sure would stump her. He told the story of Carl Friedrich Gauss, the famous German mathematician, who was born in 1777.
When Gauss was a schoolboy, one of his teachers asked the class to add up every number between 1 and 100. It was supposed to take an hour, but Gauss had the answer almost instantly.
“Does anyone know how he did this?” Juárez Correa asked.
A few students started trying to add up the numbers and soon realized it would take a long time. Paloma, working with her group, carefully wrote out a few sequences and looked at them for a moment. Then she raised her hand.
“The answer is 5,050,” she said. “There are 50 pairs of 101.”
Juárez Correa felt a chill. He’d never encountered a student with so much innate ability. He squatted next to her and asked why she hadn’t expressed much interest in math in the past, since she was clearly good at it.
“Because no one made it this interesting,” she said.
Although this Wired piece focuses mostly on Sugata Mitra, it does once again highlight the story of Paloma Noyola. Unfortunately, after a brief spurt of media attention, little on Paloma was ever mentioned and, as was pointed out by Wired, nothing was ever said of Mr. Juárez.
As with most stories in the Mexican press — and with in the middle-class — things suddenly become very important once it’s featured in a gringo publication. Which is a very sad commentary. We hope, however, that this story pushes those in the press, state and federal government to look not to the United States for validation but to Mexicans like Sergio Juárez doing good work in places like Matamoros.
The clear message in this story is that there are thousands of Paloma Noyolas going to school in Mexico who, just like her at one time, are not being challenged and therefore aren’t very interested in school. This story can, if we want it to, raise enough awareness to shift the discussion from poverty to opportunity.
Paloma truly personifies both Mexico’s challenges and unleashed potential.
Read the entire Wired story here: How a Radical New Teaching Method Could Unleash a Generation of Geniuses
Editor’s note: As an addendum, Wired provided information on helping support Sugata Mitra and his School in the Clouds project, and although they donated school supplies and equipment to José Urbina López School, we’re interested in seeing if we can help set up a similar fund for Sergio Juárez, the teacher featured in this story.
Also, $9,300 was raised to help fund Paloma’s education last year. We going to follow with the economist who led the fundraising campaign to see how she’s doing. Stay tuned for updates.
All I’m thinking is, “Imagine what she could do without sexism and racism in the way.”
(via pancake-angst)
Challenge #00262: One Fine Afternoon at the Student Labs of Transylvania Polygnostic University
“Pull the lever, ____!”
“Wrong Lever!”
“Reanimation, of course, is a touchy subject. Unauthorised, unwanted reanimation has been the source of many problems. Of course, it’s easier with a construct, which is why we have our projects on the electrified slabs, today.”
Professor Kransky stoked the Lightning Engine and started the turbines. “NOW!” She shouted over the noise. “PULL THE LEVER!”
Oklitov, of course, reached for the wrong one and incinerated his construct.
“WRONG LEVER, OKLITOV! GO FETCH THE SPARE!”
The rest of the class was right to laugh at him.
[Muse food remaining: 7 (fic war prompts, 0). Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]
(#00197)
“Lord Drixol’s castle is aflame!”
“No it isn’t, it’s a whacking great pile of stone.”
There always had to be a literalist in the crowd. “It’s on fire.“
"His creations are escaping! Run for your lives!”
“Um,” said the literalist. “It’s just one creature.“ They checked their pocket telescope. “And it appears to be a sheep.”
“Lord Drixol made a sheep?”
Three humble townsfolk looked at each other. This was not the usual kind of madman they were used to.
“Ah,” said the literalist as if that explained everything. “It’s a fire-breathing sheep.“
This, they mutually thought, was more like it.
"Fire-breathing sheep! Run for your lives!”
“Head for shelter!”
“Ready the bucket brigade!”
*
It took quite some time for the dreaded fire-breathing sheep to reach the town. It didn’t do much fire-breathing, but it did do a lot of being a sheep.
“Baaa…”
“MY AZALEAS!”
The literalist spoke up. “You know… we could probably just shoot it.“
The citizens nearby glared at him.
"What? Mutton’s tasty.”
[Muse food remaining: 13 (fic war prompts, 0). Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]
(#00196)
“This city is now part of the Wulfenbach Empire.”
“EEEeeeeeEEEEEeeeeEEEEEeeee!”
It was not the horrified scream he was used to. These people - all underage women, he noted - were delighted to hear such news. He glared at them. None were familiar faces.
“Are you ladies… all right?”
“EEEeeeeeEEEEEeeeeEEEEEeeee!” One fainted. Three fanned themselves. Two were crying. All seemed ecstatic that he had turned his attentions their ways.
He sighed. Teenaged hysteria. It had no cure and knew no boundaries. He was old enough to be their father, for crying out loud!
Still… a willing minion is a better minion…
“Perhaps you’d like to sign up for service duties aboard Castle Wulfenbach…”
“EEEeeeeeEEEEEeeeeEEEEEeeeeEEEEEEEEEEE!!”
Girls…
[Muse food remaining: 14 (fic war prompts, 0). Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]
Challenge #00187: One Tempestuous Evening at Club Haxx
Tarvek, Gil and Klaus with accompanying entourage, crashing mid-90’s rave parties aka Night At The Roxbury style.
[AN: I have no idea what Night At The Roxbury is, so I’m going to keep it down to three geniuses in search of an exit]
They knew things had changed. It was hard to miss. For starters, there was an unending klaxon. The space, what looked to be the shell of a gigantic clank maintenance shed, was filled, wall to wall, with gyrating bodies twitching rhythmically to the siren. There was a jungle beat in the air.
Many of the nearly-naked people in the teeming throng wore glowing jewelry. It was difficult to figure them out. There was no uniformity to their manner of dress, though garish and impossible colours seemed to be the one commonality between them.
All this, Klaus Wulfenbach saw in an instant.
His son and that Sturmvarous boy, however, had fallen to bickering.
“This is your nefarious plot!”
“This is your nefarious plot!”
“NEITHER!” Klaus roared above the ear-splitting din. “You recall that green creature we all encountered? She must have infected us with something. Now we have the ability to slide between realities as she does.”
“She claimed she had to be touching everything she was touching when she slid in,” said Gil.
“No doubt there’s a further trick to it,” said Tarvek. “People aren’t that honest.”
“Then, logic dictates that we resume what we were doing before the slide.”
Which was fighting.
Which was how they got tossed out of the rave.
It was a dark and stormy night.
[Muse food remaining: 1 (fic war prompts, 0). Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]
(#00178)
[AN: Set sometime after Agatha’s return to Mechanicsburg]
They always came to Sparks once a stronghold was established. A tribe of natural minions with a talent for surgery and reanimation. Their balms and poultices could perform miracles still unknown to the rest of modern science.
The Heterodyne kept one on in her castle, on the very good chance that they might come in handy - on one condition.
It was a combination hospice and employment agency, with one name for the employees. Igors and Igorinas alike had found jobs in the hospital and various households of high standing.
And now they were offering their ‘thervitheth’ around Mechanicsburg.
Carson stared down at the gnarled figure on his doorstep. “And you don’t mind being… minions to minions?“
"Igorth are made to therve, marthter. It ith our plathe.
"And… you have to lisp?”
“It’th our trademark,” said the Igor. “Begging your pardon, marthter… but I heard you were due to undergo a thpethial operation nethethary to your pothition?“
Carson mentally rearranged the consonants. “Yes, I’ve been dreading that for a while. Why?”
“We can arrange to have the thurgery performed painlethly, with a minimal recovery period.”
“The Heterodyne will doubtlessly demand to watch.”
The Igor smiled. He knew he had a job. “We are very uthed to the martherth’… ideothyncrathieth…"
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(#00169)
She should have known, because it was too quiet. Zeetha had become too used to the sounds of battle to listen for them in the midst of conjugal bliss.
And in the morning, Mechanicsburg was lost.
Not fallen. Not burned. Not destroyed.
Gone.
As if it had never been there.
Many of the armies had fled. A few lost clanks littered the field of former battle and one lone Wolfenbach monitor ship patrolled amongst the clouds.
“…no…” Zeetha breathed. Her heart fought to sink into the core of the planet and leap out of her mouth at the same time. It couldn’t be happening. Not again.
Not again!
Those few humans still on the field leaped in terror as a new howl rang over the plains below where Mechanicsburg used to be.
“ZUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMMIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIILL!!”
Axel Higgs, roused from the depths of the clank they had shared, looked out over the empty battlefield and the vast expanse of mountain range where Mechanicsburg wasn’t.
“Huh,” he said. “It’s never done that, before.”
Rage overtook her. Such epic fury had leveled a pirate fortress, but Higgs held her off until her body failed her and she collapsed in a fit of tears.
“…not again… not again… lost all over again… [I was beginning to think I had gone mad…]”
“[You are not mad. Skifander is real,]” soothed Higgs. “[And Agatha is alive. We must live with these two faiths, Princess.]”
“You… speak Skiff?”
“I’ve been around,” he said with a half-smile. “That’s not important, right now. Right now, you and I need to find out what happened to Agatha, and maybe even Mechanicsburg, and set things right.”
“How can I possibly—?”
“Let’s start by rounding up a few remaining witnesses, eh?”
Fighting! That, she could focus on! Zeetha grabbed a sword and prepared to leap out and do battle.
“But you might want to get dressed, first?” Higgs suggested.
Zeetha looked down at his shirt on her body and blushed.
*
That had been two years ago. A chain of vigorous interrogation lead her and Higgs to *this* snow-swept, hidden mountain range. Where a secret, hidden lair of the Knights of Jove may just be keeping a time travel device.
The problem with that was, that snow-swept, hidden mountain ranges were just *teeming* with secret, hidden lairs. All owned by different Sparky nutjobs with differing agendas and associated secret societies.
Some days, Zeetha felt like she was going through them in alphabetical order.
She shook one of the surviving, robed adepts until he woke. “Where are the Knights of Jove?”
“…dunno…” he squeaked. “We’re the Shrouded Cavalcade of Eee…”
Another day, another smoking ruin of a formerly secret, hidden lair.
“I’m coming, my Zumil,” she said to the whipping wind. “I’m coming. Remember all I taught you. Rememb—” She fought the sting in her eyes.
She had a promise to keep.
[Muse food remaining: 7 (fic war prompts, 2). Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]
It's... It's Green
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Girl Genius AU with added Sara :)
(#00163)
“Monster delivery!” sang the maid as she entered.
“That’s a monster?”
“That’s a maid?”
The red-head curtseyed. “F’give me sir, but I was told to deliver this green beast to this lab.”
“RHHAAAAAAARRHHH!”
“I did not order a monster.”
“Nor did I.”
“Probably a mix-up at the warehouse again.”
“You stay here -ah- miss. We’ll sort this out in due course.”
Sara stepped out of the cage and spat out her false teeth. “So much for the obligatory stupid guard.”
“Remind me again why *I* had to be the maid?” demanded Tarvek.
“You look cute in the little cap. That, and that frilly little scrap was not my size.” Sara gave him an appreciative measure up and down with her eyes. “And you have *lovely* legs.”
“Can we get ON with this?” Tarvek hollered.
Sara gathered supplies from the false bottom of the cage and vanished towards the enemy’s achilles’ heel with a gleeful little giggle.
“…lovely legs…” Tarvek muttered, beginning to stomp as angrily as he could manage in high heels to their mutual target. He passed a mirror, and couldn’t help but look.
“Damn right I do,” he said, and sashayed onwards.
[Muse food remaining: 6 (fic war prompts, 1). Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]
(#00161)
“READY!”
“What I want to know is—”
“STEADY!”
“—who thought this was a good idea?”
“COOK!”
Gil winced as the klaxon blared. “Well, given the -ah- intense emotion, and the fact that this town’s had enough battle…”
“PENALTY FOR KNIFE THROWING!”
“…I thought this was slightly more rational.”
One competitor had not bothered attempting to sabotage the competition. She had knives flying, all right, but they were chopping, slicing, dicing, julienne-ing and otherwise preparing food. The grim determination in her face spoke a lot more than any of the commentators did.
Yes. Sara had a lot to hide…
“After how much ‘special’ coffee?”
Gil glared at Tarvek. “I haven’t touched the stuff. But I am keeping some in reserve for… ‘special’ guests.”
“You mean the ones that argue too much and won’t listen to a sane word?”
“That’s them.”
“That’s… that’s…”
“Cruel beyond reason? Strange and unusual? Poetic?”
“…perfect…”
The watching crowd oohed as several pans caught artfully on fire.
“I thought so, too. They’re much more willing to at least listen.”
“Pity your little green girlfriend had her biochemistry altered by a madman,” Tarvek noted. “You could have made her… talkative.”
“Have you seen her on normal coffee? Or even substandard coffee?”
“No.”
“Well, she’s what happened to the Gallery of Misery after one small cup.”
“…eeeeeeeeeeesh…”
“Needless to say, I forbade further experiments in that field.”
“Five!” the audience cheered. “Four! Three! Two!”
BLAAAAAAAAAAAT!
All competitors stepped back from their trolleys.
“Why are the judges sweating?” asked Tarvek.
“I told them it was this or the coffee. And when a Jaegermonster is one of the competitors…”
“Ah. Of course.” Jaegermonsters not only ate things that could fell a mere mortal, but relished them as delicacies. It added a certain… edge… to the competition.
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