I was always interested in the natural sciences and math as a child, and was usually on the "Dean's List" making straight A's. It was inspiring to have a Professor for middle school algebra and geometry, and I've adopted some of his methods into my teaching. My scores on standardized tests such as SAT math and GRE math and chem were in the 99.9 percentile (although admittedly the verbal scores were only in the 99% range).

I received awards for academic excellence including CRC in Chemistry as a college undergraduate, and graduated magna cum laude, with a major in Chemistry and minors in Math and Physics, just about 0.01 GPA below summa cum laude. In grad school, at CalTech in Pasadena, I spent time as a research associate as well as a teaching assistant. My research was in Chemical Physics, studying molecular orbitals and quantum mechanics, and my degree was obtained based in part on the submission of research published in respected scientific journals.

For a while, I was in industry, but resumed academic endeavors in 2001, first as a private tutor and then serving as an adjunct professor at a large Florida college. I taught both math and chemistry there. I did some accuracy checking for a major publisher of textbooks; my reviews were exhaustive and thorough. Some of the work involved checking answers to test bank questions, and some was refining study guides. Unfortunately, some medical issues surfaced in 2015, making it difficult to stand for hours at a time, so for a year I worked as an in-house tutor at the college. Sometimes, I helped one student at a time, and others I worked with 5 or 6 students at a session. After that, we moved to Georgia, where I have tutored privately as well as for a well-known tutoring center.

I take great pride in hearing from students (or parents) how well they did, as a result of the sessions we put in. Their success is attributable in large part to the fact that my style requires some significant interaction on the part of the student; I don't simply spoon-fee