Introducing Mayeesha Zahin, Middle/Upper School Math

Mayeesha has been in the building since 2017 as a substitute and has served as a beloved tutor for a number of Roeper students and graduates.

Mayeesha has come to the rescue two times taking over for math teachers on a temporary leave. When a full-time math position opened up for the fall, we were incredibly fortunate that Mayeesha was ready to become part of our community on a more permanent basis.

Mayeesha’s college coursework was in economics, political science, and biology, and her educational experiences have ranged from early childhood to standardized test prep, to math instruction from early levels through calculus. Mayeesha shares “While I did not pursue Mathematics as a major, it has always been my passion to help mold young minds in how to think in a logical manner. We all aspire to help develop the minds of our students to be deep thinkers and conscientious doers, challenging ourselves and our students to step outside their comfort zones.”

I am excited to be part of the Math department, focusing primarily on Middle School math. I will also be also part of the 6th grade team, and am very excited to see my new Middle Schoolers find themselves and their strengths from the very first stage at this campus. 

Marrying my other half and having 2 amazing – and very different – kids definitely have been highlights, but I find my daughter’s daily show of immense patience and love for her little brother to be the daily/weekly highlight of my life.  

 

I am a child of a Navy-trained Merchant Mariner, and have sailed the high seas since I was a few weeks old. The smell of the salty sea water makes me feel oddly at peace. My dad’s profession had allowed me to have a bit of an atypical childhood – missing a quarter of school every year! I probably visited over two dozen countries by the time I was 8, with 3rd grade being my first year with full attendance in school.

 

“Home” has always been a moving target for me. I was born in Dhaka, Bangladesh, brought up in Singapore from 2nd through 11th grade, moved to Miami right before Senior year, went to colleges in DC and NY, then moved to Indianapolis after a whirlwind courtship and a BIG wedding in Bangladesh in December 2012. My little family has made Michigan our home for the past 8 years. Home is where loved ones are, and not just a geographical location, and my heart does seem to be scattered across multiple locations. 

 

I am also truly bilingual – I think in Bengali when I speak it, no translating in my head. I often don’t even realize I am switching languages and many people don’t realize it’s my second language. 

 

 

If I could throw in a little bit of time travel as well, I’d love to spend a year in the 90s in small town Bangladesh, a little town called Feni. This is where my grandparents were established, raised their families, and paid it forward to their communities in amazing ways. My grandparents’ legacy lives on through the schools and hospitals they built for the less well off in their communities, and even now, our family remained involved in various roles. 

 

Despite all their work and societal commitments, my grandparents always made time for their huge brood of grand kids. The memories I have of my childhood in the 90s, visiting them and seeing new additions to the cousin gang, are just magical. I would accompany one grandad to his office to get candy treats secretly, and accompany my other grandad walking all around the village talking to the farmers assessing their progress and life changes. It feels different in their absence now, but we try to find any excuse possible to travel to our hometown and partake in silly things (our favorite is telling each other ghost stories and other scary legends on the rooftops of our grandparents’ homes, after putting the ‘adults’ to sleep). 

 

I used to debate and sing back in the day, and though I am not much of a public performer any more, I am still a bathroom (or living room when the house is not occupied by others) singer – and I primarily enjoy singing in my mother tongue though it’s become my second language. I am also a bit of a current affairs aficionado, but since being in the US for 18 years now, I feel like my world has gotten more US-centric rather than global. Every so often, you’ll find me engrossed in an Agatha Christie mystery! Sometimes, that’s an audio-visual BBC interpretation rather than the books, but discovering my first Agatha Christie novel in 5th grade is probably one of the greatest highlights of my childhood!

 

I really enjoy tutoring SATs and ACTs because all it requires is a solid foundation of young age curricular knowledge, and fun ways of applying that knowledge creatively and efficiently. There’s a bit of thrill and adrenaline rush with the time crunch. I also get to know my students’ thoughts and aspirations, and it allows me to stay grounded to the hopes and dreams of today’s youth and not get jaded with age. Though I teach math, I hope to impart critical thinking skills and an ability to be empathetic and portray good sportsmanship in competitive situations. 

   

 

I have gotten to know a couple generations of Roeper kids over the years (they say every three years is an academic generation). It is never boring at Roeper!