10 Facts About Claudia Zaslavsky

Claudia Zaslavsky was an American mathematics teacher and ethnomathematician.

Claudia Zaslavsky was born Claudia Natoma Cohen on January 12,1917, in Upper Manhattan in New York City and grew up in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

Claudia Zaslavsky attributed her first interest in mathematics to her early childhood experiences when she helped her parents in their dry goods store.

Claudia Zaslavsky studied mathematics at Hunter College and then earned a master's degree in statistics at the University of Michigan.

Claudia Zaslavsky became a mathematics teacher at Woodlands High School in Hartsdale, New York.

Claudia Zaslavsky's work was welcomed into the burgeoning field of ethnomathematics, which studies the ways in which mathematical concepts are expressed and used by people in diverse cultures in the course of everyday life.

Claudia Zaslavsky was a lifelong activist for civil rights, peace and social justice.

Claudia Zaslavsky mentored many new scholars and activists in the field of ethnomathematics, always remembering the importance of discovering and recognizing the mathematical accomplishments of groups currently underrepresented, including women.

One of her children, Alan Claudia Zaslavsky, became a teacher in Kenya, a progressive activist, and later a statistician.

Claudia Zaslavsky died of pancreatic cancer in Harlem, New York, on January 13,2006, survived by her husband Sam and their two sons.