Ceramics and calculus highlight the newest member of the CGS math department | Humans of Catlin Gabel

Margot Camp ‘23

Courtesy of Beth Gilmartin. 

From teaching high school math to taking weekly ceramics classes, Beth Gilmartin’s life is all about education.

Raised in a small suburb outside of Boston, Gilmartin has a mother, father, and older brother. She grew up watching TV in Harvard community rooms, as she was brought to work with her mother, who was a professor of 21st Century Women’s History of China. Gilmartin’s father was also a professor, so she grew up surrounded by academic settings. She discovered from a young age that Harvard students are scared of kids. 

“Harvard students, it doesn't matter if they reserved the TV room, if there's a five year old in there coloring, they’ll just leave”

Although she spent much of her time on campus with her parents, Gilmartin took part in afterschool rock climbing, as the head of a “very non competitive” rock climbing team, where she “wasn’t the best one” but the “most responsible one at following all the rules.” She enjoyed knowing how to keep everyone safe, because something she was good at. 

Her strong interest for equity and inclusion started in high school when she tried to make her school a better place for everyone. 

“At the time I was very frustrated with the pace of progress, because I was in high school, and in retrospect my school was actually doing a lot compared to competitor schools…When you’re 16, sometimes you lack that perspective and you want everything to just happen immediately.” 

Gilmartin took part in her high school’s Diversity Committee which was made up of both faculty and students interested in working to improve the school to make it an improved place for all students to learn. 

This passion has continued into her adult years, as she looked for teaching jobs across the United States, focusing on schools that strive to uplift these values. She emphasized that she observed many schools had not changed since the time she was in high school or even the time when her parents were in high school. Gilmartin was looking for a “forward looking” school, a place that was open to change.

“I was prepared to do a search of schools for several years, and I was looking for a school that had a progressive identity, that was leading an experiential education.” 

These standards narrowed down her search significantly.

Gilmartin is new to the Catlin Gabel School (CGS) community this year, and teaches several Upper School math classes, Statistics and Calculus. 

As a teacher, Gilmartin shared how by taking ceramics classes with former CGS teacher Dale Rawls, she gained a perspective of how it feels to be a student. She described how the trial and error of ceramics, a difficult art form, put her in the shoes of her math students, and the frustration they might feel while learning.

“It’s a lot of failure and practice and learning by doing.” She said, remembering watching her pieces fly off the pottery wheel and comparing her work to the other students around her. 

Experiencing the irritation of knowing how to do something, but not seeing that manifest in her physical work helps her relate to her students, as a teacher, especially in a subject that many students struggle with. 

If you see Beth around campus, give her a friendly wave and a smile.