Senior Brigham Bailey has always had an appeal for math. To him, it was like a puzzle needing to be solved. There was always a definite answer and he just had to solve the equation correctly to get it.
Bailey has now worked his way up to this year’s Math Sterling Scholar.
“I figured I had a pretty good chance at [getting] it, just because I’ve taken all the AP math classes and it was just something I was pretty good at,” Bailey said. “I figured that I could probably go far with it and that I’d do pretty well and so I took my chances and went with it.”
Bailey didn’t get to where he is now by luck though. He has had to face challenges by consistently putting in hard work.
“Being able to do the classes I’m in now, I had to skip two grades of math,” Bailey said. “So, over the summer between ninth grade and sophomore year, I did all of 11th grade math online and that was pretty brutal just because it was summer break and I wanted to go hangout with friends, but I was doing math.”
Although Bailey has had challenges within math, it has helped his personal growth a ton.
“It’s challenged me a lot, all of my hardest classes that I’ve taken have been math related,” Bailey said. “I’ve taken all of the AP math classes that Weber High has to offer and so I’ve always known that I was going to have math homework everyday from all of high school but it’s helped me be focused and know that I can take challenging classes and as long as I continue to do my work then it shows.”
Bailey said if you are wanting to improve your math skills, you should pay attention early on.
“Math is one of those subjects that it’s always building on,” Bailey said. “You don’t realize it, but the stuff that you did the year previous is going to be built upon the next year. So, the more you stop paying attention early on, the harder it’s going to get later down the road. So, as long as you stay focused and know what you’re doing at the beginning then every time you add a new concept into it, you should be able to understand it a lot easier.”
