Joseph Baker Email & Phone Number

Since high school, I have had a deep passion for Spanish and technology. In high school, I started tutoring students in Spanish for a student run group called TEACH. I continued teaching students Spanish in college as a private tutor for a company called Wyzant. As a tutor, I carried out numerous responsibilities such as creating custom made lesson plans for students based on their goals and proficient levels and crafting study schedules to precisely guide my students' learning. My interest in technology has primarily manifested itself through pursuing personal projects and a dedication to staying up to date on the latest tech trends. My most ambitious personal project has been creating an algorithm in Microsoft Excel for calculating the quality of tennis matches. I started off by brainstorming ideas on how I could use a few key statistics (winners, unforced errors, and total points won) to estimate the quality of a tennis match. Then, I inputed a series of both common and custom made equations into Excel to calculate forced errors, player performance scores, a match competitiveness score, and a match quality score. To create a scale which clearly defined how changes in the match quality score reflected the entertainment value of the match, I analyzed data from more than 50 professional tennis matches and identified patterns. Finally, I tested the accuracy of the algorithm by comparing the match quality score of more than 50 professional tennis matches to the personal opinions of people who had watched these matches.

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  Private Tutor

  Wyzant

  Mar 2018 - Present

  Wyzant is an online platform where tutors can market themselves and tutor students in their areas of expertise. During my time working at Wyzant, I have helped countless people overcome their challenges with the Spanish language. In order to do this in the most efficient and effective manner possible, I always stress to my students that communication is the foundation of our professional relationship. By always maintaining clear lines of communication, I'm able to consistently identify what my students are struggling with and design a unique plan to help them. Once I have a strategy in mind, I carefully plan out each of our sessions together and keep detailed notes to monitor my students' progress. I also keep an open schedule so that I’m able to tutor my students whenever they need me, even if they reach out to me at the last minute. Through this process, I have helped all of my students acquire the results they were working towards. I initially became a tutor because I had a strong desire to help people. At first it was difficult to attract clients, so I did a lot of outreach through Wyzant’s platform to convey to people why I would be a good match for them. I did this by emphasizing that I would prioritize doing whatever was necessary to help them improve in Spanish. Furthermore, I promised to create an environment where they not only would find success in Spanish, but also learn to enjoy speaking and learning about the language as well.