Cornell Engineer 4.0 GPA| 2x AIME | 8 Year Tutor Experience

Myeonghak L.

I hold a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University with a 4.0 GPA and completed two years of PhD-level Aerospace Engineering research at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. It was during my time as a Teaching Assistant at both Cornell and UIUC that I discovered my true passion — working directly with students was far more rewarding than anything I did in the lab. That realization led me to make a deliberate career change into full-time tutoring, and I have never looked back.
My primary subjects are SAT Math, ACT Math, AP Physics, and competition mathematics at the AMC and AIME level. I have worked one-on-one with students ranging from middle school through college, both in individual sessions and groups of up to 12. During my undergraduate years I tutored five students long-term — each for one to two years — and all five achieved a perfect score on the SAT Math section. More recently, I have helped five students qualify for the AIME, which places them in the top five percent of AMC participants nationally. I also improved one AP Physics student's grade from a B minus to an A within four months.
My approach centers on understanding rather than memorization. I never hand a student an answer — instead I ask what they tried, what they already know, and guide them to work through the problem themselves. For students who are struggling I build pattern recognition gradually so that problems stop feeling overwhelming. For advanced students I push deeper, connecting mathematical concepts to real-world applications and challenging them to think beyond the formula. I have been tutoring students as young as middle school and as advanced as college-level engineering, and I am comfortable adapting to wherever a student is.