An educator on why she’s bothered by ‘girl math’

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Girl math is a new take on spending and it works like this: If something costs less than $5, it can be considered free. If you buy something and then return it to the store for a refund, you make money. If you don’t buy something on sale, then you lose money.

In the view of math educator Vanessa Vakharia, girl math does not add up. Ms. Vakharia runs the Math Guru, a math tutoring studio in Toronto, she‘s the author of a book series for kids called Math Hacks and she has a podcast called Math Therapy. She was so bugged by the idea of girl math that she got in touch recently to vent. I suggested a newsletter Q&A, and here we are.

Q: Vanessa, what do you make of girl math – is it a modern take on the math of personal finance, a way to rationalize spending on things you can’t afford?

A: I really think girl math started out with the best of intentions: As a way to fight the idea that girls are irresponsible and frivolous with their spending. It all started in New Zealand on a morning radio show, Fletch, Vaughan & Hayley. The hosts created a “girl maths” segment to help female listeners justify expensive purchases, ranging from expensive purses to lash extensions to skin care. While the whole thing is being positioned as something gendered that applies only to the feminine, the concept is simply a rebrand of a cognitive psychology term called “mental accounting” which we all do. Simply put, it’s a mindset where someone places different values on the same amount of money, based on some subjective criteria and often leading to detrimental results. So, in girl math terms, one might say, “because I returned a dress for $100 and then bought a new one for $90, I actually gained $10, so I didn’t spend anything!” My opinion? Mental accounting is often just math gone wrong.

Q: How might girl math work on the purchase of $300 dress?

A: If you’re going to wear that dress three times and the cost of renting a dress for each of those three occasions would have been $150 each time, then sure – you’re saving money in the long run. Where this becomes problematic is when you’re using this logic to justify purchases you can’t afford. Say you’re going to put that $300 on your line of credit and it’s going to take you months to pay off. In that case, you’re missing out on the mathematical and financial consequences of paying off the interest that’s going to accumulate, and the stress that’s going to accumulate along with it.

Q: What do you think of math being used to justify spending?

A: I hate it. I think that calling it “math” is a generous term in most cases. I mean, to say that if something is free if it costs less than $5 is just incorrect. That’s bad math. Actually, that’s not even math.

Q: You said in an e-mail that girl math is “a trend guaranteed to put girls even farther to the back of the math classroom.” How might this play out?

A: This is the part that’s really upsetting to me, because I have worked for over a decade to eradicate the outdated stereotype that girls are bad at math and as a result, can’t manage their finances. My biggest issue with this trend is that it’s called girl math. It implies that only girls justify their spending this way, and it’s premised on the stereotype that girls can’t do math or manage their money.

I’ve gotten into many TikTok debates with folks who disagree with me and say I need to chill out because this is just a “funny trend.” But what people need to realize is that it’s only considered funny because this specific stereotype about women already exists.

For me, this just feels like a giant step backward, given all the work so many of us have been doing to change the equation when it comes to women in STEM (science, tech, engineering and math).

Q: In your experience, do girls understand and relate to math differently than boys?

A: No, full stop. But I will say that we as a society have work to do when it comes to how we treat and portray girls and boys when it comes to math. Have you ever seen a single teen movie where the cheerleader character is good at math? It’s always the same story: The pretty, popular, cheerleader gets the guy, but isn’t very smart. Her nerdy friend who needs a makeover is actually the smart one and helps her popular pal out with her math homework. Things are finally starting to change a little bit now, but you have to remember that kids and teens are largely a product of the media that surrounds them, and that’s why representation is so important. So if girls only see female characters in movies, TV shows, or their social media feeds, who are all “tee-hee I can’t do math,” they start to believe that that’s what’s normal. That’s why trends like girl math bother me so much.

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