When I turned in my last midterm for “Organic Chemistry II,” I was relieved. I had been studying remotely for the entire year, and the isolation had made my first year at Yale a difficult, lonely experience. 

Only three weeks left of this hell, I kept reminding myself as I opened up Canvas one night to rewatch some lectures. I clicked on the first video and internally groaned when I saw that it was an hour and a half long. The video was black, so I enabled captions and clicked on the first time someone spoke. It was the end of the video and the two male TAs were talking. I realized that this was a Zoom recording of the midterm, and was about to close out when the first TA mentioned my name. To my disbelief, the TAs began to discuss my exam — and question my integrity and intelligence.

For problems I got right, the first TA insisted that I cheated. “How could she have known that?”

When I got a question wrong, I was mocked. “If you don’t f***ing know Baiyer’s Villager by now,” the second TA laughed.

The first TA then proceeded to tell his colleague about how badly I was doing in the organic chemistry sequence, listing my midterm grades from the first semester. It was clear that they had no idea this had been uploaded; the Zoom had been set up so that when the recording ended, it was automatically uploaded to Canvas.

I cried for hours that night, on the opposite side of the country in California. From thousands of miles and multiple time zones away, I had attended office hours, found residential college and individual tutors at Yale and formed study groups for this class. I had pored over hours of lecture videos, endless textbook readings and review sheets. And I had never considered cheating to make my life easier. 

How, in a class of over a hundred students, was that TA able to list my grades to the exact percentage? How was he able to look at my name on an “anonymous” exam and instantly label me, the girl he told to “go back to gen chem” during a review session, as unintelligent and dishonest? What was it about me that made him think that there was no way that I could have solved problems that the rest of the class could? Was it my questions during office hours? Was it the way I talked, the way I looked? As a woman of color in STEM, these are the questions I have to ask myself every day.

After speaking with the professor, who examined my test and determined there was no way I had cheated, I received apology emails from both TAs. “We try our best to grade the students’ work anonymously. Incidentally, you were the first person whose last name begins with ‘A’ to submit the examination.” These are direct quotes from the first TA’s “apology.” These are lies. My exam was clearly not graded anonymously, and I wasn’t the first student to finish, nor was I even the first student on the alphabetical roster.

I had little time to process this at that moment, as the final exam was still coming up. I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it when these same TAs were the ones grading my final exam. So I tried to move on, although it still affects the way I interact with my male TAs. I carefully ask each question so that my intelligence will not be questioned. It affects how I feel about myself, and I still wonder how I should change to make sure that I’m not perceived as someone who isn’t capable of doing well in a hard STEM class. I was hesitant about even writing this because I was afraid it would invite more strangers to make judgments about my integrity and intelligence. 

Today I refuse to hold my silence.

I’ve always known that women and minorities in STEM fight an uphill battle, but I had hoped that Yale was a safe community of equals. I soon realized, however, that misogyny is deeply rooted in the common consciousness, especially at a historically white and male institution such as Yale. I feel hopeless knowing that I face so many barriers, some of which I will never be made aware of. If the Zoom recording hadn’t been uploaded automatically, if the TAs had realized what had happened and deleted the video before I saw it, if I hadn’t happened to find the video, would I have ever known? How many other women have faced this kind of discrimination but never got to hear of it?

I used to think that it was a curse that I found the video, but now I’m more aware of the hostility that I face as a woman of color in STEM. I realize now that finding that video reminded me of the odds I overcome every day to pursue my dreams in STEM.  Knowledge is a burden I would rather bear than that of ignorance.

I share my experience now because of the impact I want to make for other women like me. We stand on this hill, looking up at the summit. Some of us turn back from the climb. Our dreams and goals, no matter what challenges we face, are valid. If my story can tell others that they’re not alone in this upward trek — if I can bring hope to just one more discouraged woman — then I am happy.

RUCHI AGASHE is a sophomore in Pauli Murray College. Contact her at ruchi.agashe@yale.edu.