Joanne Silver

Student

“When I walked into that first math class, I was shaking like a leaf. Math was pure intimidation for me, until I met Terry Green.”

The monster that is math was least of the worries for Joanne Silver when she arrived at SMC after 20 years away from the classroom. “I dropped out of high school in 1972 to go to work and first got to SMC to get my GED. I’d never realized the importance of school until I had my own children,” says the mother of two who had a very successful career in film and video production. “I mean, how could I tell my kids how important education is when I didn’t have any myself?” And so, heart in hand, Joanne began all over again.

“I was so terrified at the beginning and feeling like a real idiot. But coming back to SMC was a very comfortable feeling,” she says. “I’d been worried about being in a classroom filled with 18-year-olds. But what I found were people from all walks of life and all age groups, everyone working to fill the holes in their knowledge.” But still, the biggest ‘hole’ for Joanne to fill was the sometimes ‘bottomless pit’ known as math. “Terry Green, my math teacher, is the greatest guy and the best math teacher in the world,” says Joanne. “He’s got a heart of gold.”

Joanne is currently immersing herself in the study of arts with an emphasis on ceramics. “I have a terrible thirst to learn as much about ceramics as I can,” she says. “But I’m also deeply involved in learning about women in history. I can see now that education is the only way for women to find self-esteem and status. My own lack of education really held me back from fulfilling a lot of dreams. And whether you want to be a ceramicist or a doctor, without the education you’ll never get to where you want to go.”

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