Assingment 5 - Ethan Reed

     I think one way to help other people be more appreciative of mathematics would be to communicate how truly diverse mathematics is as a field. In the K-12 schooling system, mathematics is usually presented as this subject where you have to take a linear sequences of courses one right after the other, where you're not offered the ability to choose between different kinds of classes. It comes as little surprise then that people are astonished when I attempt to explain how varied the fields of mathematics actually are. If people knew that mathematics gave you the ability to give optimal strategies for certain board games,  produce beautiful geometric patterns from various mathematical structures, minimize damage from natural disasters such as Hurricane Florence, rather than just solving for x, I can only hope that they would find it more interesting as a subject.
     Another way to help mathematics become more approachable would be to work on the diversity within the mathematics community. The demographics of the mathematics community in the United States is much more homogeneous than the demographics of our entire country. In order for mathematics to come across as accessible for everyone, we need people from a variety of backgrounds to be actively doing mathematics. For people without relatable role models in mathematics, doing mathematics can seem to be an unattainable goal.
     It's hard to say if a handful of individual discussions can actually have an impact on the decisions are representatives make at the national level. However, at the end of the day these individual discussions are one of the few things we can do make any possible impact. By actively contributing to mathematics and spreading its value to others, hopefully our elected leaders will realize the positive impact of investing in math and science at both the state and federal level.