Native American Women Mathematicians
Traditionally, girls have not been encouraged to study math or the sciences. In the Native American culture even more roadblocks have been thrown up to dissuade women from pursuing what is seen as a man’s vocation. But so many women have studied the sciences and math and excelled in those areas that it is about time to take down the barriers in education. Freda Porter is one of only a few indigenous females to receive a Ph.D. in applied mathematics. We admire Freda Porter for her giftedness and her willingness to use her potential and resources to give back to her community.
Freda Porter-Locklear- Mathematician (Lumbee, 1957-)
Freda Porter was born in Lumberton, North Carolina in 1957. She was raised on a farm and her parents were tobacco sharecroppers. Her father realized how gifted Freda was in math. He realized that she enjoyed using her natural mathematical and problem-solving skills to help him find easier ways to pay his workers. She had discovered the joy of using numbers to find solutions.[1]
Her love of numbers led to a bachelor’s degree in applied mathematics from Pembroke State University in 1978. After completing an IBM Graduate Internship Program, she went on to earn a master’s degree in applied mathematics with a computer science minor (North Carolina State University,1981). She got married and while raising a family she received a PhD in Applied Mathematics and Computational Science from Duke University (1991). Her dissertation was “A numerical study of propagation of singularities for semilinear hyperbolic systems.” This is a real mindbender for us, but it was very useful for Freda’s work.
Freda taught mathematics at Pembroke State University at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She did post-doctoral work in applications for mathematical models of the study of groundwater contamination.[2]While at NCSU she earned Water Pollution Control System Operators Certification.
In 1991 Freda founded the UNC-Pembroke chapter of the American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES). She promoted educational programs and opportunities for Native Americans and Alaska natives to pursue degrees in science, math, engineering, and technology. For three years, she directed a UNC AISES-sponsored summer mathematics and science program for Native American 9th graders. One of her hopes was that the educated, professional Native Americans would become leaders within indigenous communities. One goal for AISES was to help Native Americans become self-reliant and self-determined members of society.
She was a member of the Mathematical Association of America’s Committee of Minority Participation in Mathematics, and in 1994-1995 she was a consultant to NASA-Langley Research Center. She has served as a consultant to the Environmental Protection Agency Ecosystems Research Division in Athens, Georgia. In In 1996 Freda was one of 20 contemporary African American, Latino, and Native-American scientists featured in a PBS documentary “Break Through: The Changing Face of Science In America.” She was appointed to a three year term on the University of North Carolina at Pembroke Board of Trustees in 2004.
Since 1997, Freda has been president and CEO of Porter Scientific, Inc., an environmental and information technology services company. Freda provides a consulting service for soil and water contamination, air pollution, and wastewater management. Her firm also provides site assessments and IT support for a wide range of customers both civil and government. This is the fruit of her love of applied math.
In an article spotlighting Freda Porter, the interviewer asked Freda about the obstacles she had to overcome switching from academia to a private business.[3] Freda explained how helpful her father was both as teacher and her example of a man who was concerned with wastewater. She helped her father with his business and not only used her math skills but learned how to run a business.
After graduate school Freda looked for problems to solve. She loved nature and was attracted to water. She attended an EPA conference where a man spoke about contaminants in water. She was fascinated with the problem of water equality and worked on it for 7 or 8 years before starting her own company.
Freda found a way to deal with prejudice against women in sciences. I will let her say it in her own words:[4]
DW (Diversity Woman): What did you need to learn politically?
FP: People want to do business with people they know. In other words, networking is very important, and everybody wants to see you giving back. So I had to rethink my approach. I knew that I gave back on the educational front, but I found that I had to apply that same philosophy to business.
DW: How much of an issue was your gender or race?
FP: In grade school, a very small percentage of my peers were girls, which was hard. In academia, they didn’t distinguish that I had brown skin. When I got the PhD, I thought I’d done all the right things and that everything would be equitable. But it wasn’t, and that was even more the case when I got into business. It was very hard to get opportunities because, number one, I’m a woman. Then, when I presented myself, my brown skin proved to be another mark against me. I felt that I was seen as somebody who wasn’t going to be able to do the work. I could flash around the PhD, the EPA research I’d done, but it didn’t matter.
DW: So how did you convince them?
FP: You do it one at a time. You don’t win the masses, but they gradually realize you’re for real and that you have a lot to offer. A lot of our customers are military, and so I serve on an advisory commission for military affairs. We try to recruit from that arena, too, and that includes both military people and their spouses. You make those inroads, and the word starts to get around—that’s the way change happens. Hopefully, when true change happens, your color goes away, and your gender goes away, too.
DW: You said that you give back on the educational front. How are you doing that?
FP: One way is by serving on the Board of Trustees of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian. We have a wonderful opportunity to bring more education to the reservations and to rural areas, especially in math and science. Right now, American Indians are at the bottom of every [educational] statistic and that’s a shame. It’s a real honor to be on the board.
DW: What two books are you reading?
FP: One is Become a Better You, by Joel Osteen. He is a pastor, and I’m so inspired by him. I’m missing my father still—he was my greatest support person—but Osteen writes that he wants to be [the reader’s] support person. That really struck a nerve. The second, Leading Through Change, is from the Harvard Business Review. We’re going through a lot of changes at PSI, and I have relied on these “change-management” topics.
The world is a better place to live in thanks to women like her. Her work continues and is recognized by such events as the Lumbee Economic Summit.
Freda Porter is a great example of an overcomer. Like many of the women in our posts, she did not let circumstances make her give up. She is gifted by God and has used her gifts to give back to her community.
[1] Many other women, including this author, have loved mathematics. For a story on another famous mathematician see post on April 25, 2017 – https://authormarywalker.com/hidden-figures-revealed-3-incredible-women/
[2] Another Native American woman who studied effects of pollution in groundwater was Otakuye Conroy-Ben. See post March 24, 2025. https://authormarywalker.com/native-american-women-scientists-otakuye-conroy-ben-phd/
[3] This is a fascinating interview and I think you would enjoy the whole article. From: Spotlight: Freda Porter, https://www.diversitywoman.com/spotlight-freda-porter/
[4] Ibid.
