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This is a quote from Doctor Who series, when two teachers are talking about a smart girl:

"She lets her knowledge out a bit at a time so as not to embarrass me."

This means that she shows her knowledge just a bit for not embarrassing him or the action of she shows her smartness just a few times don't embarrass him?

What could replace "so as not to" in this sentence?

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    She only displays her knowledge in small pieces so that she will not embarrass him by making it obvious how much more she knows than he does.
    – StoneyB on hiatus
    Commented Dec 23, 2014 at 20:29

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To answer the question

What could replace "so as not to" in this sentence

The answer is in order not to:

"She lets her knowledge out a bit at a time in order not to embarrass me."

The following is something free I'll throw in:

The word lest is a common but "formal" conjunction that means

so as not to or in order that one should not, but it uses the subject of the sentence:

She lets her knowledge out a bit at a time, lest she embarrass me.

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"She lets her knowledge out a bit at a time to avoid embarrassing me."

She does not show off her intelligence because she does not want to show how much smarter she is than the speaker. The speaker would be embarrassed if she displayed her intelligence more often.

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