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Campus Calm had
the opportunity to speak with actress Danica McKellar about yoga, glam
girl brainpower and why math (most certainly) doesn't suck. Best known
for her roles on The Wonder Years and The West Wing, Danica McKellar
is also an internationally-recognized mathematician and advocate for
math education.  She
wrote MATH DOESN'T SUCK, to rip the lid off the myth that math "sucks," helping
to show that math can be easy, relevant, and even glamorous-while providing
the tools needed to ace the next big math test!
A summa cum laude graduate of UCLA with a degree in Mathematics, Danica has been honored in Britain's esteemed Journal of Physics and the New York Times for her work in mathematics, most notably for her role as co-author of a ground-breaking mathematical physics theorem which bears her name (The Chayes-McKellar-Winn Theorem).
Danica also recently teamed up with her mother Mahaila McKellar, a certified meditation instructor, to produce Daily Dose of Dharma, a two-disc yoga and meditation DVD.
Campus Calm: Why
did you write your book MATH DOESN'T SUCK?
Danica: Because I love math and I'm passionate about helping girls to not be afraid of math.
Campus Calm: Even if you don't "get" math right away why is the reward worth the effort and struggle to understand it?
Danica: Math comes up a lot in every day life and I go through a lot of those examples in the book. Beyond that, there's something to be gained from thinking that you can't do something, struggling with it and then overcoming that challenge and succeeding. That kind of confidence that you get from going through that, I think is more valuable than any particular subject. It's a tool that girls will find will serve them in terms of the young women they will become. They need to know that they can handle challenges and that they don't back down and shy away from them.
 Campus Calm: You've been called "the smart girls' role model." Do you think we're lacking such role models in our popular culture?
Danica: I'm not sure that we're lacking them so much. It's more that the mass media chooses to focus on the negative stories coming out of Hollywood. That sells more magazines and airtime on the news shows. Claire Danes went to Yale. Natalie Portman went to Harvard and got a graduate degree. There are lots of actresses out there who are smart, who value education and who serve as excellent role models. They just don't make the news.
Campus Calm: After all the advances women have made and the pro-girl ideology and programs out there, why is it still not cool for women to be smart or to think that you can't be pretty, fashionable and smart at the same time?
Danica: There's just a lot of stereotypes and biases.
That goes for boys too. Boys can't be both athletic and smart. That's just not
true. They come from very damaging stereotypes that keep kids from living up
to their full potential.
One of my main messages is, "Look, if you want to be a glam girl someday the
most important tool for you is to be smart." If you're smart, you'll make better
decisions while you're being glamorous, you'll find a better guy while you're
being glamorous, you'll be happier while you're being glamorous. Everything is
improved by having a solid head on your shoulders.
Campus Calm: With all that being said, can't it sometimes be exhausting to be pretty, fashionable and smart at the same time all the time? My friend Courtney Martin calls it the "perfect girl" syndrome in her book Perfect
Girls, Starving Daughters.
Danica: I think that the most important thing is to not think of yourself as perfect because that's an expectation that you can never fulfill. My message is not that you have to be all these things. My message is being smart and developing your personality are the most important things. Everything else is icing on the cake. Everything else is fun!
Like many girls out there, if you're reading all these teen magazines - wanting
to look like this, wanting to wear these clothes and wanting to wear this makeup
- realize that that stuff can be fun too. You don't have to give that stuff up
in order to develop your intelligence. They go hand in hand. If these are your
goals - if you want to be fashion savvy and you want to be a glam girl someday,
then you're going to need a great job with a killer salary to afford that shopping
habit.
Campus Calm: When I was reading your book, I couldn't help but think about how girls' fear of math shapes our attitudes about finance when we're adult women. We spend too much and save too little. According to recent studies, men invest more than women. According to a 2004 report released by the Federal Reserve, only 35 percent of single women had retirement accounts, and only 8 percent had traditional pensions. More women filed for bankruptcy in 2003 than graduated from college.
Danica: My goodness.
Campus Calm: Yeah,
I hate to admit this but I'm going to anyway because it's important: I'm 28 years
old and my husband handles our 401 (k) and invests. Even though I know it's important
and realize that I'd better learn how to better handle my own finances, I just
don't seem to take that plunge. I think it stems from my own math phobia. You
say in your book that math helps women think more logically. As a young adult
woman, I don't think I'm alone here. A lot of women fear the complexity of things
like stocks, 401(k) and investing but our financial security depends on it.
Danica: That's true, that's absolutely true. Remember
that you don't have to become the expert in your finances overnight. I would
suggest just take some positive steps. Even if it's just picking up a statement,
in secret, and reading it. You don't have to understand it. Just read it. Then
put it away. Maybe next week, do the same thing again. Then maybe go online and
look up some of the terms you read about. Part of the fear is, "Well, I don't
want to look stupid to the person who does understand." Whether that person is
your husband or your father or your mother. You don't have to tell anyone that
you started this project. Just start poking around and if you're doing it in
secret it doesn't have to be as scary because there's no expectation attached
to it. What waits for you on the other side is not having that feeling of dread.
Campus Calm: What
can guys do to help change the problem of middle school girls dumbing themselves
down to appear cool?
Danica: I'll tell you what men can do. Men can
treat their wives and the mothers of their children with respect. Treat them
as though they're smart. Give them credit for what they do and what they know.
Boys will learn how to treat women by watching their fathers treat women.
Campus Calm: I read
that you recently produced a yoga DVD, Daily Dose of Dharma. Can you tell
us a little bit about that?
Danica: I produced it with my mom, Mahaila McKellar. She's been a meditation instructor for over ten years. I love yoga so we put together this yoga / meditation DVD. It's actually a two-disc set. The reason we produced it is because we wanted to see a product out there that gave busy people the opportunity to take a small break in the middle of their busy day.
There are three yoga segments that are twenty minutes each and three meditation
segments that are anywhere from five to ten minutes each. That way even though
you may think that you don't have time to be good to your body, or you don't
have time to re-center, you do. All you need is five to ten minutes.
You can take a program and it will seriously change your day. I liken it to hitting
your restart button on your computer. Things just work better afterwards.
If
you're interested in purchasing her Yoga DVD, Danica was generous
enough to offer a 15% discount to Campus Calm readers
through November 1st. When you go to the purchase screen here simply
type in the coupon code CALM15. This coupon is good for all domestic
orders (within the U.S.).
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Often times, I find that I'm holding my breath while I work. I'm holding
tension in my body while I work without even realizing it. A lot of us
do this because we live in these virtual worlds all the time online and
we're out of touch with our bodies and our physical nature. To be able
to take a break, get in touch with your physical nature, and do something
good for your body, is invaluable. I created a product that I wanted.
Campus Calm: We
help students manage things like anxiety, depression and stress. So, why yoga
as opposed to another form of exercise? I do aerobics and I do yoga and it just
seems that yoga helps with the stress better. Do you agree with that?
Danica: Yeah, yoga has been around for centuries
and there's a lot of ancient wisdom in there. The poses just get at the energy
channels in the body and they stretch the right muscles. The yoga poses really
get at the things that make the body work. Aerobics is a great stress reliever
and it's great cardiovascular exercise but there's some ancient wisdom there
in yoga. We don't always have to know exactly where it's from to know it works.
Campus Calm: A friend
of mine showed a unique talent for math at a young age and she became boxed
into a role. So much so that she graduated from college and got into finance
when she really didn't like it all that much as a career. You're an actress;
a mathematician and you just produced a yoga video. The point I'm making is
that you show us that we don't have to be boxed in by our talents. We can do
many things in life, excel in many different subject areas, and try out many
careers. But the point is creating choices for ourselves, right?
Danica: I think the point is to build your intelligence
and feel open to ideas so you don't have to have a preconceived notion of what
you're going to do or who you're going to be. If you have a solid foundation
in your studies then you'll have the confidence to pursue whatever it is that
you want.
I had a friend in college who wanted to be a doctor more than anything. She
was afraid of taking the Calculus she would have to take so she dropped the
major and did not become a doctor.
What I want to give girls, through MATH DOESN'T SUCK, is the knowledge that
they can do whatever they want to do. Maybe that's going to be more than one
profession.
I think getting boxed into a career that you don't like probably has a lot to
do with fear of the unknown and fear of "Could I handle something else?" If
you have a base of confidence and a belief in yourself, then you probably will
give yourself more of a chance to branch out and discover the things that make
you tick - the things that make you excited and passionate.
Links:
Mathdoesntsuck.com
Daily
Dose of Dharma
(c) 2007 Maria L. Pascucci / Campus Calm.
About the author:
Maria Pascucci is the President of Campus Calm - the
award-winning website for today’s stressed-out students, parents
and educators. Download your Stress-Out Less Kit with 4 FREE gifts at www.campuscalm.com.
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