When Miranda Ramirez would come home from tennis tournaments as a child, her father, Santiago would play Sudoku with her. The logic and math her parents wanted her to learn was advanced by “fun” puzzles and games.

As a self-proclaimed perfectionist, Ramirez is always looking at options as “black-and-white.” Her detail-oriented approach to tennis has helped her to a No. 90 ranking in singles this season and vaulted her to a career in accounting. She plans to graduate SU with a master’s degree and take the Uniform Certified Public Accountant Examination in the summer of 2021. She already has a contract to work for Ernst & Young, one of the biggest accounting firms in the world, even as she continues to shine for No. 31 Syracuse (12-11, 5-9 Atlantic Coast).

“She always thinks through things as if it’s a math problem,” Santiago said, “knowing that there is a right answer.”

As a child, Ramirez took to math because the “rules don’t change,” she said. A “right or wrong” approach is what her personality is at its core, Santiago said — she doesn’t like gray areas.

Ramirez started playing tennis for SU in January 2017 but she was nervous when she first got accepted. Ramirez wasn’t in the school she chose Syracuse for — the Martin J. Whitman School of Management. It had the “brand recognition,” and had various data like number of graduates that fit her standards.

She transferred into the school during her second semester, and Ramirez planned to study business but had to find the best path to get there. She settled on accounting, largely because of the professors, she said.

Ramirez invited two of them, MaryAnn Monforte and Ginger Wagner, to Syracuse’s match against Pittsburgh on April 5.

“It’s kind of like when one of your kids says they have a game, how do you not go?” Monforte said.

Monforte and Ramirez bonded immediately over a shared tennis background. Monforte formerly played on a United States Tennis Association Team and, when Ramirez found that out, she asked her professor to come play with her at Drumlins Country Club sometime. Monforte declined, saying, “I haven’t played in a long time. I think you would smoke me.”

“And after seeing her play: she would,” Monforte said.

Last summer when Ramirez went home to Texas, Santiago invited her to visit his office. Ramirez was introduced to the company’s financial controller, who offered advice and gave her a project.

The company needed analyses done on product warrant information, and as Ramirez was recently Excel certified, they gave her raw data and told her to “tell a story from it.” Ramirez was able to show trends, spikes and other things out of the norm, which “blew me away,” Santiago said.

About a year before Ramirez started thinking about colleges, her parents discussed owning a business themselves. Ramirez would jump in, Santiago said: “‘If you guys start a business, I’m going to start a business.’”

“I know she’s got something up her sleeve,” Santiago said. “She’s got something cooking.” 

Published on April 17, 2019 at 12:47 am

Contact Arabdho: armajumd@syr.edu | @aromajumder