What is my tutoring approach?
•The focus is on teaching students to understand and think in an atmosphere of warmth, patience, and friendliness to free students from fears, calm anxieties, and reduce insecurities.
•To effectively teach and motivate students depends on understanding them. A good way to understand them is to listen to them and to observe them. Their goals, their strengths, their constraints, and their preferences are important to learn.
•The main tutoring products are insight and improvement, not necessarily a whole lot in one thing but probably a little bit in many things, probably not 100% in one thing but rather 10% in ten things or maybe even 1% in 100 things.
•We will use habitual improvement to “chase perfection” and never reach it but, in the process, we will “catch excellence.”
•Interest, excitement, importance, and relevance are developed and stimulated through pictures and diagrams, examples and samples, and uses and applications from or with respect to nature, science, business, health, finance, and engineering to show the relatedness of things.
•A main goal is to improve decision productivity and quality, the speed and accuracy of solving problems. This is done through insight and better methods of problem solving and through using both sides of our brains and several styles of thinking, not just logical sequential thinking, and through understanding the problem and checking the answer in more than one way.
•There is some use of theorems and proofs, questions and definitions, drill and repetition, and logic and reasoning. However, I mainly use a problem solving laboratory approach with many word problems and numerical problems for learning by doing. The what, why, how, and so what are reviewed and explained.
•Students are taught to do the work and to efficiently and effectively:
-separate important information from irrelevant information
-frame, link, structure, and focus the problem for solution
-apply proper analytical methods to solve the problem and check the results
-write and orally explain the solution, the rationale, the steps, and the implications
•A sense of competence, “confidence, courage, curiosity, and constancy” (firmness of mind) are cultivated to “make dreams come true” by applying knowledge to the challenges of life and, as a result, be happier and more hopeful.
•Younger students are taught to:
-Read assignments before they are covered in class in order to have questions ready to ask when the topic is covered.
-Seek and use feedback promptly to learn quickly, avoid misunderstandings, and build on a solid foundation. For example, if homework is not corrected by the teacher or a computer, check answers in the answer section of the workbook, if an answer section exists. If an answer section does not exist, check results with a couple of other students or in some other way. Consider texting a couple of motivated friends in the evening to check the answers to some or all of the homework problems. Ask for help by emailing or calling me for free if they get three different answers. Use interactive testing sites. Everyone needs feedback to learn and adapt. With discipline and determination, students can get the feedback needed to improve.
-Think clearly and confidently with quality and precision.
-Know what they do not know for sure.
-Use Wikipedia and other sources (PlanetMath, MIT’s Open Courseware project, etc.) to look up topics and learn about related topics.
•Undergraduate and graduate students are encouraged to creatively identify alternatives and consider the total system involved, use multiple decision and thinking methods, use several influence and communication styles, and focus on response time and overall productivity (including quality, speed, and value).
•Doctoral students are taught to communicate effectively, to use different communication styles where appropriate, to apply statistics properly, to think critically and anticipate other possible explanations, to check information and decision processes carefully, etc.
How may I help you?
•With quantitative methods, especially mathematics, statistics, or computers, or with business, especially economics, finance, or marketing, (e.g., algebra, geometry, trigonometry, precalculus, calculus, finite mathematics, probability, statistics, or anything from computer programming, applied statistics, optimization, or applied mathematics to strategy analysis, managerial accounting, financial analysis, valuation, pricing, or applied business economics).
•In the areas of technology or business, or in quantitative methods in support of technology or business (anything from computer software, information technology, finance, marketing, statistics, or optimization to physics, measurement, imaging science, graphics, or printing).
•Through insight, understanding, or improvement (mathematics, economics, strategy, decision, modeling, significance, change, productivity, quality, or response time).
What teaching experience do I have?
•Fifteen years of adjunct teaching experience in the evenings at the University of Rochester and the Rochester Institute of Technology in the areas of mathematics for business & management science, applied statistics and decision theory, numerical methods, and finance.
•A few months of tutoring experience through WyzAnt, Inc. in the areas of economics, mathematics, finance, statistics, managerial accounting, and computers.
What other experience do I have?
Experienced in finance in support of innovation and marketing, and in innovation and marketing. Contributed to dozens of new products, technologies, and markets, especially in the fields of imaging, decision, and information technology. Over twenty years at Kodak, over ten years at Xerox, and over four years at Disney. Professional individual contributor roles included Research Physicist, Cost Engineer, Financial Analyst, Pricing & Strategy Analyst, and Market & Sales Channel Performance Analyst. Key leadership roles included Manager, Director, and Vice President (mainly of Finance and Business Analysis but also Business & Strategy Planning, Product Program Evaluation, Industry Forecasting Methods, and Product Pricing Strategy).
What education do I have?
Completed eight years of quantitative and business study at the University of Rochester and received three degrees (BS, MS, and MBA).
•Concentrations included mathematics and physics, applied mathematics and decision theory, and quantitative methods and finance.
•Studies focused on probability and statistics, valuation and pricing, decision and management science, and management of technology.
•Completed two years of state of the art research into information and decision theory within a PhD program in Business Administration.
•Professors included several world class leaders in their fields.
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