YUKARI ITO

I’m happy that I get to do mathematics. I can think freely, and I’m very
happy when I discover new things. It’s also very interesting to have
different ideas than other people. These are the joys of mathematics.
Teaching math is also interesting. It makes me very happy when I see
that change in my students’ eyes or expressions, when they understand
something..«

»At Nagoya University, I started a women’s lunch [and] we met one hour
a week […]. We didn’t necessarily discuss mathematics. We felt the
need to meet because we had less information than men who had more
opportunities to communicate with each other, and had so much more
information. […] We women in the field, not just mathematics, could not
get the same level of information, so we would meet up at this lunch and
share information, talk about our experiences, how we felt.«

»Nowadays, many high school students focus on memorizing the answers
in their textbooks when it comes to mathematics, instead of thinking
for themselves. I think they’re missing out on the most interesting part
of mathematics. They try to memorize so many formulas, which is very
difficult. Even I cannot do that. I think if that’s what they are doing, it’s
natural that they don’t like mathematics. I want to tell them that that is
not mathematics. Mathematics is the joy of thinking.