B.S. Applied Mathematics & A.S. Physics graduate, former Division 1 athlete, and a community service member. K-12 & college level math, physics, statistics, and chess in Huntington Beach.

Find out more about Neil

• When did you develop an interest in your chosen field and in private tutoring?

  Ever since I was a little kid, I was always the smartest in math in the class, so the other students would always come up and ask me for help when they needed help on an assignment. Since then, I slowly developed an interest for it and eventually pursued a tutoring job ever since the junior year of high school. Now I am fully graduated from college and love to tutor part-time not only for some extra money, but because I truly love to help kids be better.

• Tell us more about the subject you teach, the topics you like to discuss with students (and possibly those you like a little less).

  I teach all levels of mathematics and physics, ranging from elementary school level to undergraduate college mathematics and physics. I like to see how creative the student can be while solving their problems, because there are always some interesting tricks and techniques that you can use at all levels of mathematics, and generally they can integrate into higher levels of mathematics in the future, so I like to see how students pick up on them.

• Do you have any role models; a teacher that inspired you?

  My Calculus AB teacher my junior year of high school was a big role model for me because it was not just about his knowledge of mathematics and his teaching style that impressed me, but he really got the best out of his students now only as learners, but as people too. I had attitude problems as well lacking on finishing my homework, but he pushed me like no other teacher did before and to this day I believe he really changed my life around for the better.

• What do you think are the qualities required to be a good tutor?

  Tutors must allow the students to do the work, I am not here to finish your assignment for you. I do not need to prove that I can do the work, I need the student to show their weaknesses and only then can I allow myself to intervene and take over. My sessions are going to be designed to be difficult for the student at first, and that is because the student needs to be able to figure it out themselves in order to be successful. It is essential that the tutor remains patient with the student however, as the student is likely struggling for a reason, and has trouble grasping the topic, even after multiple questions.

• Provide a valuable anecdote related to your subject or your days at school.

  Once when I was 9 years old, our class received our homework scores back for our class, and it was a difficult assignment that everyone asked for help from me. Safe to say I was also mostly wrong, which meant that everyone I helped was also wrong. For this being the case, I was teased and yelled at by my peers and cried for a long time outside because I was so ashamed of myself.

• What were the difficulties or challenges you faced or are still facing in your subject?

  As I get older and have plans of joining a graduate program, I want to make it known that concepts will continuously get harder to grasp on, and if you do not put in your full focus, it can be quite easy to fall behind. I believe that COVID for me and most likely for many of my students, has suffered from a lack of focus in some areas of mathematics that have made classes later on much harder, as we rely on the knowledge of those previous classes in order to succeed. Taking your pride out of it and going back and relearning previous material I believe is an essential step I took for myself, and want to embed for my students as well if this is something they are struggling with.

• Do you have a particular passion? Is it teaching in general or an element of the subject or something completely different?

  I would love to become ASA certified and be a senior actuarial analyst someday. I also have an extreme passion for chess, and hope one day I will get my USCF membership and compete in enough tournaments to become FIDE rated and eventually become a master of chess someday.

• What makes you a Superprof?

  I want to get the best out of my students, whether that may be from helping them in their mathematics classes, becoming a better student, or even just a better person. I find true passion in seeing my students grow, and be able to surprise me with either solving a problem better than I thought originally, or getting the test score they wanted, or just feeling that success is happening in their lives.