After 5 years as Math Department Head, Barry Merritt stepped down. Although a new teacher last year, Elizabeth Doschek volunteered to fill the position. Doschek is now the only female Department Head. Doschek began teaching geometry and calculus at Sandy Spring Friends School in the fall of 2006. It wasn’t until a year and a half ago that Doschek decided that she wanted to be a math teacher.

“I had some teaching experience between college and graduate school. And I was a teacher’s assistant in grad school. I felt like a lot of the math teachers I had in college weren’t very good at explaining the material. I thought I could explain it better,” said Doschek.

Doschek was also attracted to teaching math because of her interest in getting female students more involved with the subject.

“I like the challenge of explaining something people don’t immediately grasp,” said Doschek.

Even with a physicist and a chemist as parents, Doschek has not always been interested in math and sciences. Her parents did not push her in any particular direction, but two of Doschek’s teachers in high school did.

“Until I was a junior in high school, I wanted to be a professional violinist,” said Doschek.

Her chemistry and physics teachers changed this path of her life.

“Having those two inspirational teachers made me interested in math,” said Doschek.

Now, Doschek is trying to spark mathematical inspiration in the Upper School. One of her reforms as Math Department Head was introducing the idea of a math club. The math club now refers to themselves as The Mathletes.

“A couple of students last year mentioned that [a math club] would be a good idea. At a cross divisional meeting I brought up the idea,” said Doschek.

So far The Mathletes have participated in one competition and held a bake sale to help raise money to buy Mathlete t-shirts. Starting Tuesday, October 23rd, Mathlete members will be available in the Math modulars during academic help for tutoring.

“The goal is to get the whole community more involved with thinking about math outside of the classroom. I’d like to eventually put up posters in the lounge with brain teasers on them,” said Doschek.

When not doing math, Doschek can be found playing guitar in her rockabilly band, The Drop Tops, spending time with her family, and reading biographies of musicians.