Biography

I’ve always loved learning, and from a young age I have found joy in exploring various science, math, and engineering topics. My first tutoring experience was in college, when I volunteered at a local public middle school. I found it extremely rewarding, whether I was geeking out with a student about neuroscience or just supporting a student through their homework after a rough day.

Although a California native, I graduated from a small high school in the Marshall Islands along with 18 classmates. I completed my undergrad studies at Vassar College, where I stuck to my original plan of majoring in neuroscience and tacked on a mathematics major after I unexpectedly fell in love with abstract math. I completed an additional year of study through a dual degree program to earn a B.Eng. in biomedical engineering at Dartmouth College, and then completed my M.S. in the bioengineering department at Stanford, where I performed research on mouse brain states.

I have always been in awe of math and its ability to describe both abstract structures and real-world phenomena. However, I used to be a bit intimidated by it. Through some great teachers and course assistants in college, I was able to learn that step-by-step logic and persistence is enough to understand even the most esoteric of concepts. Number Theory remains one of my favorite classes that I’ve ever taken. With my students, I aim to dispel the myth that they’re “bad at math” if they don’t immediately understand something and look forward to those lightbulb moments that make all the hard work worth it.

As an undergraduate, I spent three semesters mentoring middle school students across the curriculum. I also served as a 1-on-1 tutor for Linear Algebra in college and as a TA for the engineering Systems class. At Stanford, I was TA for my advisor’s class on optogenetics for two years in a row, where I got the opportunity to lead classes at the graduate level. These teaching experiences contributed to my philosophy for tutoring, that student comprehension should lead the way. We’ve all been in situations in school where we were forced to memorize long lists of rules and facts, but the key to long-term learning is a solid understanding and intuition of “why.” As a tutor, I try to guide students to arrive at their own understanding by step-by-step reasoning.

Outside of the tutoring office, I enjoy hands-on hobbies like sewing, woodworking, and climbing.