Sagher standing near some sort of miniature train.

The question is often on our minds: where are all the math majors on campus? Surely we must have some here at Kenyon. Are they nice? Are they sane? Do they look like normal humans? Well here is your chance to meet a math major: Abby Sagher ’15, from Ann Arbor, Mich.

Where are all the math majors? Are they in the library, a hole, where?

AS: One of the perks of being a math major is you get this key to two secret rooms: a computer lab called Starr Lab and a study room for math majors only. So that’s usually — always — where you’ll find us. The programs we need are on computers in the science quad.

So do you guys bond over being math majors?

AS: Oh yeah, we complain allllll the time. 

I hear your comps are in the fall.

AS: Yeah, that’s why you don’t see any senior math majors on campus, because they’re always in Hayes … math just kind of consumes you.

Yikes.

AS: … like, in a good way, if you enjoy it. 

Tell me more about how math “consumes you.”

AS: Well, when you’re taking a math class, you have homework for every class due. It’s not like a paper where you can have weeks to work on it. And on top of that are lots of projects. And a math paper, actually, which I didn’t really understand. But they’re hard. 

So why are you a math major?

AS: Because I like knowing that there’s an answer. I like knowing that I’m right, and if I’m not right there’s a way to get to the answer. People ask me this a lot, so this is kind of rehearsed. 

Favorite part of math?

AS: I guess my favorite topics so far are derivatives and integration. 

And then she said something math-y that I didn’t understand but if you’ve taken calculus more recently than I have you probably didn’t need the explanation anyway. She went on to add: “the limit does not exist.” Apparently math majors make Mean Girls references too.

But actually, Abby is cool. Go talk to her … just kidding you can’t she lives in a secret math room in the science quad.