St. Mary’s Academy in New Orleans received a $1 million pledge from former NBA star Charles Barkley after two of its students made a unique breakthrough in mathematics. Calcea Johnson and Ne’Kiya Jackson, then high-school seniors, developed a new proof of the 2,000-year-old Pythagorean theorem using trigonometry. Their work attracted attention after they presented it to the American Mathematical Society, and Barkley later saw their achievement on television. The story prompted him to support the school and the opportunities it gives students beyond the classroom.
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