Educated: A Memoir

Westover recounts her memories of preparing for college in earnest. Her boss introduces her to the Internet, which she has never heard of before, and shows her how to visit webpages and send emails. She uses this new knowledge to look up BYU’s website. The next day, she drives 40 miles to buy ACT study guides and math textbooks so that she could learn math.

That October, Westover drove to the opera house every night, both to avoid Shawn and her father and to study math in peace and quiet. She studied algebra but could not figure out trigonometry on her own. Tyler told her to come to BYU so that he could tutor her. Using all the knowledge he had acquired as a mechanical engineering major, Tyler helped her learn the principles of trigonometry.

While they studied one night, Faye called. There was an accident on the site where Gene and the crew were working. Shawn had fallen from 20 feet in the air, landed on his head, and had been airlifted to a hospital. Westover admits that, at the time, she got conflicting details from the rest of the crew about how it had happened, but one thing was clear: It was a miracle Shawn had not died.