Last year, two Catholic high school students in New Orleans, Louisiana, utilized their trigonometric skills to solve a puzzle that had stumped mathematicians for nearly 2,000 years. At the time of their noteworthy discovery, the teens attended St. Mary’s Academy, an all-girls Catholic school founded after the Civil War to help young black women.
Initially, the two girls entered a math competition to win a $500 prize. Upon completing the quiz, the two girls, Calcea Johnson and Ne’Kiya Jackson, began working on a bonus question, challenging them to find a new proof for the Pythagorean Theorem.
Reportedly, over 300 documented proofs for the Pythagorean Theorem utilize mathematical disciplines such as algebra and geometry. However, there has never been a recorded proof of the theorem (that determines the length of the side of a right triangle if the lengths of the other two are known) that uses trigonometry. In fact, solving the problem with trigonometry was thought to be impossible for 2,000 years.
During an interview with CBS’ Bill Whitaker, the two girls noted that they were determined to solve the problem despite its inherent difficulty. “I started something. I need to finish it,” Calcea said. “‘Cause I was like ‘$500 is a lot of money. So I — I would like to at least try.”
They were given the bonus question in December 2022 and reportedly spent the next two months diligently working on the problem. Calcea’s parents, Cal and CeCe Johnson, illustrated their daughter’s hard work and commitment to the problem.
“She was like, ‘Mom, this is a little bit too much,'” Calcea’s mother said. “So then I started looking at what she really was doing, and it was pages and pages and pages of, like, over 20 or 30 pages for this one problem.” Cal added, “Yeah, the garbage can was full of papers, which she would, you know, work out the problems, and if that didn’t work, she would ball it up, throw it in the trash.”
Ne’Kiya’s mother, Neliska Jackson, explained to CBS that her daughter’s mathematical comprehension was far beyond hers. When asked if she looked at the problem the girls were solving, she answered, “Personally, I did not. Cause, most of the time, I don’t understand what she’s doing.”
“So, are you math geniuses?” Whitaker asked the girls, impressed with their accomplishment. “I think that’s a stretch,” Calcea answered. “If not genius, you’re really smart at math,” Whitaker followed up. “Not at all,” Ne’Kiya said lightheartedly.
“Well, our teacher approached us and was like, ‘Hey, you might be able to actually present this.’ I was like, ‘Are you joking?’ But she wasn’t,” Ne’Kiya explained. “So, we went. I got up there. We presented, and it went well, and it blew up.” Ne’Kiya and Calcea presented their discovery at the American Mathematical Society Conference in Atlanta in 2023.
Before Ne’Kiya and Calcea’s outstanding accomplishment, only one person in 2,000 years was documented to have solved the theorem using the same method, Dr. Jason Zimba, in 2009. Since then, the two former high school students have gone to college to pursue bachelor’s degrees. Ironically, neither of them will pursue a career in mathematics.
Note: The featured image is a screenshot from the embedded video.
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