Eve O'Neill

Biography

For as long as I can remember, I was one of those kids who loved math and also loved to learn. I knew I wanted to work with people, but as I didn’t have any close family members in STEM, I didn’t really know what that would look like. I really liked most of my math teachers in high school, but deciding on something then felt like a big commitment.

After graduating from high school in San Jose, I left for the central coast and pursued my mathematics degree at Cal Poly SLO. A bit of a nervous student, I gathered study groups and pooled study guides with my peers at the beginning of many of my classes. In my second year, emails were sent out about applying for the University’s summer research program. After reading through the proposals and prerequisites, I took an interest in a project on values in undergraduate mathematics curriculum, applied, and the professor accepted me. Around the same time, I started tutoring at the University’s Writing and Learning Center to see if education was something I wanted to pursue.

Working with students through the tutoring program and also as a campus tour guide challenged me to answer questions from all kinds of students and to ask the right ones when they weren’t sure what to say. One of my favorite parts of tutoring is finding the right question to ask a student to get them through a breakthrough moment.

In addition to sharing my love of math, I love hiking, cooking, road trips and train-trips, and using new types of stationary.