A parent-teacher conference leads Eugenia Duodu to question whether she can be a scientist.

Eugenia Duodu is the Toronto-based CEO of Visions of Science, which inspires kids from low-income and marginalized communities to pursue careers in STEM. As a youth born and raised in a low-income community, she strives to maintain a strong connection to her local and global community by being a mentor and advocate. Her goal is to help make a long-lasting positive impact in communities through STEM engagement and in-turn allow youth to unlock their potential. Eugenia holds a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Toronto.

This story originally aired on May 3, 2019 in an episode titled “Confidence: Stories about finding your voice”.

Story Transcript

So I remember my first bad parent-teacher interview.  These things always made me super nervous anyway because you never know what your teacher is going to say about you or expose about you.  

So I’m there sitting in the hallway reflecting on what kind of student I've been for the last little while.  And I know that I've been a good student. I get good grades, I get along with my classmates, I don't really talk too much but I talk just enough to get participation marks.  Everything seems to be okay and I don’t think that this is going to be a problem at all.

My teacher calls me into the room.  My mom is sitting there looking a little concerned.  I already know that this is going to be bad.

My teacher turns to my mom and says, “You know, I just don’t understand Eugenia.  I can’t tell if she's giving me attitude or not. And sometimes, she comes off as really aggressive.”  

The Grade-Four me is sitting there like, “What are you talking about?”  

So she goes on and my mom is pressing her like, “So what is she doing that’s so strange, that’s so out of character?  She's such a kind sweet girl. How is she changing in the classroom?”

My teacher’s responses are extremely vague and she kept saying, “I just can’t pinpoint it but I just can’t handle her attitude.  And she makes these facial expressions. They're very… I don't know.”

So at this point I am making facial expressions and I’m getting an attitude because I’m like, “Who are you talking about, lady?  I am doing so well in your class and I’m really trying hard.”

But I leave feeling defeated because now I’m questioning who I am as a person.  I’m questioning what type of person I am. I’m thinking through every single interaction that I've had in the classroom, going through every single incident that’s happened and seeing that if I could have possibly done something to make my teacher feel this way.  After all, that’s my teacher and I trust her. So if she says that I am a kid that doesn’t have a good attitude, am I a kid that doesn’t have a good attitude? Am I really aggressive and angry?

So I’m sitting on the bus with my mom, feeling really sad and she turns to me and says, “You know what?  Don’t worry. I know that you're a good kid.”

So I carry on with my life and these subtle remarks followed me throughout elementary school and it was super confusing.  I was either seen as this brilliant student with so much potential or this student that’s full of attitude. I never knew what to do because, if I was assertive, I was seen as rude or angry.  If I was presenting rebuttal to a student’s comment, I was seen as being rude. I didn’t know what confidence looked like anymore because I was second-guessing every single one of my actions. This is all while I’m trying to learn and do well and survive in school and be a good kid.  

As I’m navigating through these things, I also recognize that I have this passion for science.  It’s so weird because I didn’t feel like I could share this passion with anyone. I was living in a low-income community quite far from the school that I attended.  I would go to my community, see people like me, be around people that I've grown up with that didn’t really share that passion for science, and then I'd be whisked away to my school that was quite out of my writing and be one of six black students in the entire school having to navigate my personality while also trying to learn.  

And in this I was wondering, “Can I be a scientist?”  I’m not really seeing any scientist that looked like me or have my life experience.  After all, I don't even know if I’m a decent person so how can I do that.

As I’m navigating through these various life lessons and life things, I get to high school.  Somehow, by the time I got to high school, I had been seen as a student that was quite confident, fairly assertive and getting very good grades in all her subjects.  

I get into high school and I’m in Grade 10 and I decide to take a course that was only offered at my school, Introduction to Biotechnology.  At this course, we got the opportunity to do hands-on experiments and wear lab coats. I have to tell you, the first time I donned a lab coat I immediately changed.  I don't know what it was. I put on a lab coat, I put on those goggles and, suddenly, I’m walking around the classroom like, “Yes, what do you have over there? Uh-hmm.”  I just felt like this confident scientist and I hadn’t even done any real science yet.

When I started to do the actual science, my life was completely transformed.  I would go to my teacher and be really enthusiastic about the assignments that we had.  And he would continue to stoke that enthusiasm with more information and more encouragement.  I was starting to shed a little bit of the baggage of trying to sort out what type of person I was and if I was too much or too less.  I just needed to know what I was doing and be curious and be confident about that, so I was.

One of our main assignments was identifying an unknown bacterial strain.  We each got this little vial and we had to spend the entire last half of the semester trying to put together all of our knowledge to identify what was in this vial.  I finish my project two weeks before everyone else. It wasn’t because there was anything special about me, I just loved it. I inhaled all of the information. I was there as late as I could be.  I loved it.

So I was passionate.  My passion for science and my confidence in science had grown.  So I head over to my guidance counselor because I had already chosen my courses for Grade 11 and I really didn’t think that I was going to pursue science up to this point.  

So I run over to my guidance counselor’s office really confident that I’m going to make these changes.  I had done super well in this biotechnology class and I had done well in science at this point. So I got to the guidance counselor and I was like, “Okay, I need to take Chemistry, Biology and Physics, please.”  

She looks at me she's like, “No.  I think that will be too hard for you.”

I’m like, “I’m sorry.  I'll say this again. I'd like to take Chemistry, Biology and Physics, please.”  

Again, she's like, “No, this will be too hard for you.  It’s a really tough course load. I don't know if you know how hard it is.  Physics is super hard too. I don't think that you want to go through this.”  

I’m like, “But I finished the Biotechnology project in three weeks and I’m doing really well.  I don't understand why you don’t think that I can do this.”

Then she says, “Wait a minute.  You're Keisha, right?”

Spoiler alert.  My name is not Keisha.  It’s Eugenia.

So I said, “No, I’m not,” and she then proceeds to pull up my marks.  

Afterwards, after kind of a back and forth, feeling really flustered, she just sends me out of the office.  

I go home.  I tell my mom about this story and that sweet lady that told me, “Don’t worry.  You're a good kid,” turned into someone else. Needless to say, I was registered in Chemistry, Biology and Physics by the end of it.  

And as much as I continued to struggle with finding my place, figuring out if I put up my hand right now and I give an answer, what kind of confidence should I have in my voice?  How will that be seen by the people around me? Maybe I shouldn’t put up my hand at all.

As I've navigated through that, I always remember that confidence that I had putting on that lab coat for the first time and what that did in terms of me being able to discover something.  I’m so happy that at least for that moment, I was able to take control of my narrative and I've been having to do that ever since, but I’m so happy that I did. Thank you.