Last week, I was called to sign my name on a patent application. That form also asked for the citizenship of the person. The admin who prepared the forms had prefilled that field as ‘USA’. I pointed it out to her to make a correction that I am a citizen of India. She jokingly asked if USA wasn’t good enough for me to be a citizen. I have spent most of my adult life in US and it has been very happy, but, this conversation started me thinking about all the things that I think are wrong about the United States. I don’t want to make that list here, but, write about just one incident mentioned by a co-worker.

This man is a very successful scientist and his wife is a tenured professor at Michigan State University and runs a big lab with big research grants. They take an active interest in their children’s education and volunteered to participate in ‘Career Day’ at their daughter’s school. The school teacher organising the ‘Career Day’ called them a few days before the event to inform them that they need not go for it. No children had signed up to talk with the ‘Scientists’. They were completely taken by surprise. Their own daughter went to meet with the ‘hairdresser’ to explore it as a future career option.

Students doing well in science and math are looked down upon and termed geeks and nerds. It is just very uncool to do well in school, especially for girls. This really scares me. What is my daughter going to do when she goes to school?