Dedicated, diligent and demanding Physics PhD - Maths tutor with Stephanie

Stephanie wasn't just an outstanding academic tutor who successfully navigated me through my PAT and interview, but she also provided me with advice, guidance and motivation which helped me keep my head throughout the process. She always made herself available and was extremely supportive. I strongly recommend Stephanie if you're considering taking the PAT for Oxford or preparing for interviews.

This time last year my son was dealing with the disappointment of not getting an interview at Oxford to read Physics. Having used this to motivate himself, he decided to reapply after gaining really good A level results. We were so fortunate to find Stephanie on the this site website because she made a huge difference to his application. John became aware of the commitment required and Stephanie provided links to all the resources he could use to prepare, discussing any problems he had with the material during weekly tutorials. Her encouragement enabled him to stretch himself, helping him to achieve huge progress in a short space of time. She was always available, via phone or internet, if John had any problems. John needed to work very hard, but Stephanie worked hard for him too; she even produced her own PAT-style questions for him! John found the exam itself much less scary than the previous year, and Stephanie also gave him invaluable help in preparing for the interview. John was very fortunate to have her on board, and we cannot recommend Stephanie highly enough.

Stephanie prepared my son for the PAT. He had applied the previous year and had not got an interview. This year, Stephanie's tutoring has given him a great deal of confidence. She worked so hard to provide and suggest resources for him, and was always available to answer any questions outside the tutoring sessions. Stephanie inspired John to challenge himself and to push himself to reach his full potential. Highly recommended!

Stephanie is a very inspiring coach in developing my son's problem solving and mathematical skills required for UKMT and Physics. She is very well prepared, highly committed and already started feeding us with past papers before the first session. Her methods are very effective and creative. My son enjoyed the sessions with great enthusiasm and we benefitted from her great guidance and advanced approaches.

Stephanie agreed to take me on for tutoring in my CQF course in January 2015. The course was a mix of finance, economics, stochastic calculus.

Having initially struggled with the level of maths, she took me through 4 months of preparation prior to the course starting and continued until I'd reached a level to continue the course on my own.

Stephanie worked through several problem sets with me, identified weak areas, provided additional topics and ensured I understood each subject well enough before moving on.

We progressed through Linear Algebra, Calculus, Differential Equations, Probability and Statistics; before moving on to the main course material of Stochastic Calculus and Advanced Probability methods as applied to Derivatives/Option Pricing and Volatility methods.

I found her tutoring to be well-prepared in advance, well-researched in terms of the subjects and related topics and delivered with a view to the next step forward.

She was always on time, extremely helpful and provided consistent encouragement and advice when going through difficult periods. I couldn't have asked for more from a tutor, and would recommend her to anyone in a similar position.

I've never been keen on having a tutor before but when I realised I needed help for my maths AS level I was lucky enough to find Stephanie. She was great at helping me work out where my problem areas were and was fab about explaining things as many times and in as many ways were necessary until I understood it. She helped me build confidence, giving me space to try and work things out on my own but never left me stranded when I was struggling. Before I started working with Stephanie I felt on track for a painful process and a disappointing result but thanks to her patience and encouragement the process was verging on enjoyable and I'm hoping for a good result. Stephanie is funny and I really enjoyed spending time with her -- I looked forward to doing maths for the first time.

I wanted to learn how to play squash, so Stephanie volunteered to tutor me. She taught me the different types of shot available, and tactics I should employ during matches.

We did a variety of exercises focused on good shot execution, and then we had a game where she played a little bit above my level. I used the tactics and shots she'd taught me to win points against her.

She's a delightful tutor, always very personable and focused on how we can improve my game. I felt in very safe hands and my game came on leaps and bounds! Thank you Stephanie!

Stephanie helped my son in a crash course for the PAT test as soon as I realised that his school had not been supporting him. She did a lot to boost his confidence and covered a huge amount of material over 2 weeks, always making sure that the revision was being absorbed. She covered several areas where there were knowledge gaps. Overall she improved his chances of passing the PAT test from "very doubtful" to "really good" in only 2 weeks.

Guidence and help for sitting the PAT exam is not something my school or teachers could provide for me so getting a tutor was a priority and Stephanie is a great one! I think she is excellent when it comes to picking up on my common mistakes which is exaclty what I needed. Most importantly I developed the way I think and approach unfamilliar content. She really cares about supporting her students and I am certainly much more confident and stronger with tackling what used to mainly be frustrating pile of questions!

TSA (Oxford University entrance exam) preparation for maths and problem solving questions

My son had fallen apart during his first year of maths degree to the extent that he had not picked up a pen in most of his exams!
Stephanie made a huge effort to really get to grips with the syllabus and create a plan. She gave Matt a huge amount I confidence and motivation, so after a very few days he clearly believed that he could do it!
I cannot praise her enough. She is also lovely person who really cares about her students!

As a postscript to my review above...

Stephanie is a highly valued, brilliant Physics postgraduate who has made outstanding contributions to Imperial College's Outreach Postgraduate Ambassadors Programme.

Stephanie visited schools to talk about Physics and to inspire students in primary schools, secondary schools and Sixth Formers Colleges. She is a confident speaker and her talks engage, interest and excite audiences from 20 to 200 students.The Outreach Office at Imperial was lucky to have Stephanie help us to promote STEM subjects to students and to raise their aspirations to HEIs. She also taught students to write a good Personal Statement and was a good role model. Her visits to schools and colleges were much appreciated. I have received excellent feedback from teachers. Schools have asked for her to go back for more.

Stephanie also helped by going to HE Fairs in different schools to promote Imperial College. Stephanie helped us to build good rapport and working relationships with schools.

I am very grateful to Stephanie for sharing information about her Physics academic research with students. I have enjoyed working with Stephanie for the last two years and am happy to recommend her to anyone who wants to work with her.

Stephanie tutored our daughter in the run-up to the Oxford Physics Aptitude Test (PAT). Our daughter found her approachable, focused and motivating, and during the time she was tutored her confidence improved hugely along with her scores. She found her explanations of tricky subjects illuminating and her manner very friendly. She felt she really knew what she was talking about and found her a sympathetic "mentor". Stephanie guided her not only on how best to consolidate knowledge of the syllabus, but also on how to approach the more challenging questions in a fruitful way and not panic! She fed her piles of very useful test material to practise on, and was always at the end of an email to answer queries before the next session. She was also very helpful with guidance on how to get one's brain into the best shape for a challenging paper: the right measure of work (not under-working, but not overworking either) and the importance of keeping regular hours leading up to the exam - things that seem trivial but are crucial. She showed absolute dedication to the mission my daughter was on and it has been a very nice and very positive experience. We couldn't recommend her more highly.