Imagine a guy telling his whole engineering class, loud and clear, that female students aren’t his equals. As I’m typing, your eyeballs might be out of their sockets, and you might be searching for an egg or two to fire. While your mind is busy creating the worst-case scenario of academic misogyny, stay with me. The guy suddenly changes his tone of voice – “you and I cannot be equal. You have already conquered far more to be in this field than I will ever face.” Of course, the female students had to work harder, stronger, better and faster to make it in this world! And what were you thinking? In the blink of an eye, Jared Mauldin transforms into a humble hero of modern class. His thought-provoking letter, published on Eastern Washington University’s student news site, has been taking the internet by storm. No thunder, though, as many have turned to him to say “thank you”. Read Mauldin’s full letter below:

Image credits: A Mighty Girl

Speaking with the Today show about his piece, Jared Mauldin said: ‘Really, when you look at this letter, I said nothing new. I didn’t say anything that another feminist writer hasn’t said before. The distinguishing factor happens to be that I am a man. That is a problem.’ Sadly, it’s true that women in the field of science face a grim reality. Catalyst, a global non-profit organization that seeks to empower women in workforces, conducted a study and discovered that the gender gap in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) begins with education. The gap is exceptionally wide in information technologies, where women account for up to only 18.8% of the highest grades in class. As if that’s not enough, a 2014 study discovered that both men and women were twice as likely to hire a man if the job required math.

Take a look at what people had to say about the viral letter: