WASHINGTON — Louisiana students Ne’Kiya Jackson and Calcea Johnson wowed their teachers in 2022 when they discovered a new way to prove the 2000-year-old Pythagorean theorem in response to a bonus question in a high school math contest. But that was only the beginning. A volunteer at their former school, New Orleans’ St.
Mary’s Academy, encouraged them to submit their work on the famous mathematical theory to a professional conference, and in March 2023 they became the youngest people to present at the American Mathematical Society’s Southeastern Sectional conference in Atlanta. Their appearance elicited a wave of media coverage, including a spot on “60 Minutes.” The pair also received symbolic keys to the city of New Orleans and a shout-out from Michelle Obama.
Now Jackson and Johnson, who started college last year, have notched another achievement: authoring an academic paper detailing their original proof — plus nine more. Their work was published Monday in the scientific journal American Mathematical Monthly. “I’m so surprised that we’re getting published in a paper at such a young age,” Johnson, a sophomore studying environmental engineering at Louisiana State University, said in a video shared by the journal publishers.
“I didn’t think it would go this far,” said Jackson, who is pursuing a doctoral degree in pharmacy at Xavier University of Louisiana. Pythagoras was an ancient Greek philosopher and mathematician who lived 2,500 years ago. I.
