ABOUT RICK

I began my career as a full-time math and science teacher at Harvard-Westlake. When I left to launch my tutoring practice, I continued to cover classes at several other well-known Los Angeles independent schools, returning to Harvard-Westlake when needed, stepping in at Marlborough, Buckley, and Mirman when teachers were out sick or on retreat, and teaching chemistry at Windward until they found a permanent replacement. Working inside these schools for so many years gave me a deep understanding of how they teach math and science, and exactly what they expect from their students.

That background shapes every tutoring session I do. Rather than imposing my own method, I structure each lesson to align with how the teacher is presenting the material. My goal is to help students succeed in their class, perform better on tests, gain confidence in the material, and learn how to communicate more effectively with their teachers.

In addition to academic tutoring, a major part of my practice is preparing students for the SAT and ACT. I've been doing this one-on-one for over 30 years, and I’m fully up to date on both the digital SAT and the new ACT. I start every student with a diagnostic, having them take both tests timed, so we can determine which test is likely to give them the better score before committing to either one.

Most of my students are middle school and high school students, many attending schools in the greater LA area, such as Harvard-Westlake, Marlborough, and Marymount, though I also work with college students. Since everything I do is online, location is never a barrier. I’ve had students in Nebraska, Florida, and New York, and as far away as London, Haifa and Dubai.

One thing I’ve learned over the years is that most students who come to me aren't struggling in any fundamental way. They’ve fallen behind because of an illness, a packed schedule of sports or theater, or a gap in foundational knowledge that just needs to be filled in. A few targeted sessions can often make an enormous difference.

Each online session uses a two-way interactive whiteboard, so it genuinely feels collaborative rather than one-sided. After every session, the whiteboard is saved as a PDF so students have a permanent record of exactly what was covered. Students and parents are welcome to text or email me in advance with the material to be covered, which lets me come to each session prepared and focused.

I’m happy to say my students have been successful in being accepted into the colleges of their choice, including Barnard, Berkeley, Boston College, Brown, Claremont McKenna, Chapman (Dodge College of Film), Colby, Colgate, Cornell, Duke, Emory, Georgetown, GWU, Harvard, Howard, U Indiana, U Iowa (Writers’ Workshop), Loyola Marymount, Michigan, Middlebury, U Missouri (Journalism), Notre Dame, Northwestern, NYU, Oberlin, Ohio State, Parsons, Penn, Reed, Pomona College, Rice, Santa Clara, St. Andrews, Savannah College of Art & Design, SMU, Stanford, Tulane, UC Davis, UC Berkeley, UCLA, UCSB, U Edinburgh, USC, U Richmond, U Miami, U Texas, Vassar, Villanova, Wake Forest, Washington University, Wesleyan, Wisconsin, and Yale.