Alex S. is a PCH tutor from Fresno, CA, and a junior at Pepperdine University. He is majoring in biology and planning to graduate in the spring of 2020. He admits he didn’t necessarily expect to fall in love with both biology and tutoring, but it all makes sense once you get to know him and his love for problem-solving. Find out what makes Alex thrive and how he hopes to use both his biology degree and that love for creating solutions to help reduce global pollution and impact world health.

What are you studying?

My major is biology, and I’ve been focusing my undergrad research on cellular biology. When I was in 11th grade, I took one AP bio class and just loved it; in fact, I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I loved it. From that day on I knew I was going to be a biologist. I think part of the reason I fell in love with biology is because I’ve always loved problem-solving; if you put a puzzle in front of me I want to solve it and I go after it with a single-minded intensity. Biology is kind of a puzzle in that way - you’re trying to unravel how something works and figure out exactly how something is going on.

What is something you’d like to do after you graduate?

As of now, I see myself going to grad school for research. I want to do cellular research, probably in the fields of medicine and climate change, and I’m looking into exciting opportunities in those fields. Some of the research I’ve been doing at school is on pollution's effect on the human immune system. Pollution is currently the main environmentally-related cause of human death worldwide, so I think that’s topical, and important to get sorted out. Personally, I feel convicted in this area.

What inspires you as a tutor?

Problem-solving is a big part of why I love tutoring. Helping kids figure things out is kind of a problem/solution in its own way. I also love the spare moments between problems, getting to know students and learning their idiosyncrasies - how they act, and who they are as people. It’s fun to bond with them and you end up being a tutor but also a little bit of a friend or mentor even within that authority structure.

How did you decide to start tutoring?

I spent a month one summer in Taiwan teaching English to middle schoolers, which showed me a love for teaching I didn’t know I had. I signed up to go on the trip because I was interested in Chinese and had studied Mandarin for four years in high school. But when I got over there, I was like, wow, this is great, it’s really fun!

Now when my friends have trouble in class, they come to me and I’m the one who teaches them how to solve the problems. So tutoring is a natural fit.

Do you have any tutoring success stories?

There was a student I worked with for a long time who had a lot of stress in their life - but I think my consistent presence around them while acting correctly and kindly despite the tough environment helped to mitigate their stress, and the student’s grades improved.

What’s some advice you’d like to share with students?

Try new things - really just broaden your horizons and don’t let yourself be held back by social constructs or fear. Put your finger in every pot and try everything that might interest you, because you might never know what you’ll like until you find it. Sometimes we don’t end up finding our true passions until we experience things we’d never have guessed we’d love.

What are some of your hobbies outside of tutoring and biology?

I love to go on adventures. That might be weird and vague to say, but specifically I love hiking up mountains, swimming in the ocean or any rivers, and cliff jumping. I’ve dirt biked for more than 10 years. I also love philosophy and reading Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli and Milton - I enjoy discussing those types of things as well as human history and anthropology.