By prioritizing each student’s academic agency, Luke Kramer’s tutoring sessions help them reach their SAT/ISEE test prep goals and master complex topics in math and science. Dr. Kramer is a General Academic alum, having first entered our doors as a high school junior. Now back as our Study Lounge Lead Tutor, we sat down with him to discuss his background in education and tutoring style.
Luke: the Student and the Tutor
Luke grew up in Houston and went to high school at St. John’s, which is when he first came to General Academic for his SAT test prep. He went on to graduate magna cum laude from Harvard with highest honors in Chemistry before moving across the pond to pursue an MPhil (Masters of Philosophy) in Chemistry at Cambridge as a student at Christ’s College. After a year in the UK, Luke returned to the states to attend Northwestern for medical school.
Since moving back to Houston after earning his medical degree, Luke has spent his time working in research, applying to medical residency, practicing his country dancing, and tutoring with General Academic. Back in our offices 13 years later, he’s teaching students who once sat where he did.
Luke tutors General Academic students with many subjects and classes, and he is especially well suited to ISEE test prep, SAT test prep, and any math or science-heavy coursework. He started teaching when he was in high school, where he led an Algebra peer tutoring program, and he later did workshop tutoring and small-group tutoring when in medical school.
To his students, Luke brings a deep knowledge of the subject matter and a calm, thoughtful, and encouraging teaching style. His favorite part of tutoring is when students get that “aha” moment: “With the right prompting, a student can see a problem in a totally different way.”
Subjects in Focus: Math & Science
As he has considerable training in chemistry and medicine, Luke has a formidable repertoire of math and science knowledge that he enjoys sharing with his students. While he’ll tutor “any subject area of greatest need” to the student, he mostly tutors SAT & ISEE test prep, and his favorite subject to tutor is SAT math.
When it comes to his favorite topics in chemistry and medicine, Luke is most interested in pharmacology: how drugs work in human bodies. “I could spend hours reading about the binding target and mechanism of action for a drug, or for an interesting natural product,” he says. Luke’s enthusiasm for math and science is motivational to students who are struggling with the subjects—he is patient, clear, and encouraging, with a strong ability to help them work through difficult material step by step.
Tutoring Sessions with Luke
Luke’s approach to tutoring gives students the support they need to achieve their goals. He describes his tutoring style in three words: the socratic method. Through questioning, Luke helps students cover all the gaps in their understanding and learn how to find the answers themselves.
Further, he integrates ideas from andragogy (adult learning) into pedagogy (teaching kids) to help students develop ownership of their education. He says, “I guess you could say I treat my students like adults.”
Let’s dive into a typical tutoring session with Luke, with a particular focus on how he takes the typical approach of General Academic tutoring and uniquely adapts it to make his sessions productive and effective.
1. Touching Base
A typical in-office session with a General Academic tutor starts with a trip to the General Academic kitchen for snacks, followed by a few minutes of checking in. After reinforcing any lingering concerns from the previous session, they determine the focus of the session based on what the student has in mind. Whether they need support with school work or to focus on test prep, the session will be driven by their goals and input.
By asking, “What do you want to work on today?”, Luke helps the student practice self-directed learning—they take ownership of their time in the session, and they also take accountability for their efforts during practice.
Luke prioritizes asking questions throughout the whole session, asking students about their goals and checking in on their understanding of the material.
2. Guided Growth
Students need much more than a lecture to learn. During practice, Luke gives step-by-step guidance through problems, asking targeted questions about the student’s problem-solving and decision-making processes. He says he has one rule in all tutoring sessions: “I require them to speak out loud and narrate as they solve problems.” Narrating the steps of problem-solving instantly points out any error or misunderstanding to both Luke’s ears and the student’s.
Another strategy Luke employs is transference/counter-transference, which involves the student identifying the memories and experiences that arise when encountering new information. He says that he may ask a question like, “What is this problem bringing up for you?” This approach identifies issues that can prevent a student from understanding new information, such as previous failure in the topic and math anxiety or underlying knowledge gaps.
What fuels it all is having a growth mindset, and Luke aims to develop this in his students. “You can improve at any skill,” he tells them. No concept is beyond someone’s reach if they believe in themselves and put in the work.
3. Wrap-Up: Goal-Setting
Assignments are based on the student’s personal capabilities, their goals, and their thoughts on how much extra practice they need. When it comes to setting any kind of goals, Luke largely goes with the student’s goals. Leaning into their objective helps them steer their academic journey—this is important practice in setting a concrete goal and working towards it.
However, many students can reach beyond their expectations. “Sometimes,” Luke continues, “I’ll realize students have more in them than they think, and I’ll prompt them, ‘Hey, I think you could actually get a perfect score on SAT reading.’” He helps students take charge of their learning and grow confident in their abilities and potential.
Beyond the Classroom
Outside of the General Academic study lounge, Luke enjoys running, reading, and gardening.
Q: What do you like to do for fun?
A: “For a long time, it’s been reading, biking, and running. Now that I’ve moved back to Texas, I have started country dancing, so I’m trying to get better at that.”
Q: What’s your favorite book? Favorite movie?
A: “My favorite book is Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoevsky. It’s really soulful and thoughtful, but also devastatingly funny at times.
My favorite movie is Escape, a South Korean thriller about a North Korean soldier who defects across the DMZ.”
Q: What kind of music do you like?
A: “Indie/shoegaze. Death Cab for Cutie, Hovvdy, Pinegrove, Fakemink, Westside Cowboy, Witch Post. In high school, I DJ’ed for KTRU, the Rice University radio station.”
Q: What’s your favorite holiday or time of year?
A: “Easter! I’m Roman Catholic and I love the Triduum (Friday-Sunday of Easter Weekend for us).”
Q: If you could have dinner with any three people, living or not, who would they be and why?
A: “Abraham Lincoln, Ella Maillart, and my sister. I’ve admired Lincoln since I read Dorothy Kearns Goodwin’s biography Team of Rivals. Ella Maillart was a Swiss photographer and travel writer who rode horses all around the Soviet world in the 1900s, before AirBnB and Google Translate. My sister does me the favor of including me in a lot of her “three people to dinner” answers, so I would feel bad not reciprocating.”
Private Tutoring with General Academic
General Academic’s subject and test prep tutors provide the structured support to accommodate your student wherever they’re at. We help our students with a wide range of materials, ranging from 1st through 12th grade subject prep, ISEE, and SAT. To get the ball rolling, give us a call at (713) 838-7774 or fill out our tutoring request form.
