Having struggled with self-confidence as a younger student, I tutor to help others push through that same imposter syndrome. What I really care about is teaching students how to learn, building the resilience and self-assurance that carries them beyond the classroom.

During my time tutoring high school math this past summer, I worked with a student on the autism spectrum who struggled with severe test anxiety and would often shut down when problems got more complex. Instead of rushing to the answer, I focused on understanding how he actually thought through a problem, so I could adapt to that instead of forcing my own approach. He was clearly a visual learner, so we started translating abstract concepts into pictures and diagrams, breaking problems into smaller pieces and using active recall to help things stick. Once we'd built a low-pressure space where it was okay to mess up, we could actually catch the exact moment an error happened and work on helping him self-correct. Over ten weeks his practice scores went up a lot, but the bigger victory was watching his anxiety turn into confidence.

My biggest strengths are active listening, building intuition, and strengthening executive function. I break down a student's thought process to find exactly where things go wrong, split big tasks into manageable steps, and keep the dialogue mostly student-driven so they build momentum and learn to self-correct.

To me, a positive learning environment starts with psychological safety. Students need to feel like they can ask any question, or get something wrong, without being judged for it. I also think the best sessions are ones where the student is doing most of the talking, while still having clear objectives that keep things focused without feeling rigid. This way, students stop performing for the tutor and actually start thinking out loud, which is where learning happens.

Mentorship, to me, means taking a holistic approach, caring just as much about a student's self-assurance as their academic performance. I think back to my mother, who worked as a speech pathologist and had this patience for celebrating even the smallest progress, and that's shaped how I see the role. A mentor should help students work through personal hurdles just as much as intellectual ones. It comes down to building a foundation of trust where someone isn’t held back by anxiety or insecurity, so students walk away with the confidence and mental tools to handle more than just what we work on in our sessions.