My son has been going to Alpha College Prep for almost 2 years utilizing chemistry and math…read moretutoring with Robert, SAT test prep with Taylor and now college essay writing with Jennifer. Both of us have been quite happy with the tutors and staff at Alpha. Academically, my son has raised his gpa, test scores and equally important, learned the subject matter. The tutors understand how to work with teenagers and my son feels more confident in the subject areas after his tutoring sessions. Lastly, their rates are reasonable and hours are flexible to suit the needs of students. We've been to other tutoring centers in Berkeley and El Cerrito, but none of them has produced as great a result as Alpha.

During my senior year of high school, I went to Alpha College Prep to seek help with my college…read moreapps and help with the overall process that can be very overwhelming. I worked with Jennifer, who was absolutely wonderful, and she managed to help me write my college apps that got me into top universities like UC Berkeley, Northeastern, and UCLA. With this, I also got scholarships from other universities I applied to and had an overall amazing college application experience. She helped me facilitate and better explain my ideas on paper which helped a lot. Also, before the SATs got cancelled, I used the Alpha College Prep to mainly help with the math portion of the SAT and after the first session my score improved by 50 points. I would recommend Alpha College Prep for students who are looking for some guidance during the college admission process or looking for overall tutoring in any area. I will be a freshman at UC Berkeley this fall and thank Alpha College Prep for helping me write and formulate strong essays as I couldn't have done it without them.

Jordi is an excellent tutor! She tutored our son For the ISEE test. His score turned out to be…read moreexcellent, much higher than his early practice tests, thanks to her work with him. Jordi is knowledgeable, professional, and easy to work with. I would recommend her to anyone.

Jordi tutored both my children from upcoming tests...ISEE/SAT. She is flexible, accommodating and…read morevery knowledgable about these tests. She understands how to teach kids of this age and you can tell she enjoys it.

Jayne has been my son's tutor for almost a year, and the progress he's made has been amazing. When…read morehe started kindergarten, he wasn't reading yet and now he's reading confidently, ahead in phonics, and even starting on math! Jayne is patient, kind, and truly talented. With her background in education, she's also given me great advice and insight as a parent. I really think having a tutor is one of the best decisions we've made, with all the hoops kids have to jump through at school, having such a seasoned tutor like Jayne gives them a real head start. We're so grateful for her!

Jayne was extremely patient and supportive with my 6 yo's struggle with reading. He didn't want to…read moredo tutoring but liked her enough to no longer complain about it as the sessions continued. She spent time to share with me her thoughts on techniques, resources and approaches we could use with him to identify and work with his learning and speech difficulties. I very much enjoyed working with her

I found myself a million years out of school when I decided to apply to grad school. I didn't know…read morewhere to start with any of it, least of all my essays. Like most of life's decisions, I turned to Yelp for guidance and found Carla. Carla's pricey (fear not, she offers a sliding scale) so it's good she didn't waste time mincing words or coddling. She consistently went the extra mile to ground me in what was being asked of each essay. She provided me with great resources and made thoughtful edits. Though meticulously reviewed, my drafts were always sent back quickly. Most importantly, her editing never compromised my voice, style or story. I highly recommend Carla to applicants! ***when reading reviews I always hoped the reviewers would add if they got into their school of choice. I'm happy to report I did!! :) :) Thank you, Carla!

I worked with Carla throughout the college application process as she assisted me with my essays…read more She helped me to effectively keep my voice while also making sure I was concise. She allowed me to take the wheel and treated every edit as a suggestion, careful not to detract from the message I was trying to send in my writing. Not only is she great at helping with essays but she is quite possibly one of the nicest people I have ever met. Beginning every meeting with a "How is your day going?" goes a long way during such a stressful time. I will be attending Brown University this fall and I truly could not have gotten through this journey without her. I am immensely grateful for her wisdom and support.

1. Josh is a math guru! It probably has something to do with his fancy Yale architecture and Cal…read moreengineering degrees combined with his experience working with middle school and high school math students. Thanks to his test-taking strategies and math tips and tricks, I feel prepared and confident to sit for the GMAT exam in a couple weeks. 2. Although a bit embarrassing to admit, Josh's experience teaching high school math really came in handy. He is patient and has a clear way of explaining the material to a lug like me. 3. He is a great motivator. He went above and beyond just tutoring math by pushing me when I needed that extra kick and even encouraging me to apply to Top 10 schools. Josh could be a life coach! 4. He works with your schedule and his rates are very competitive. Josh is a godsend! Highly recommended!

From the owner: I am interested in working with all age levels and math subject matters up through pre-calculus, as…read morewell as SAT, ACT, GRE and GMAT (math sections) tutoring. I'm a former engineer who is now in my third year working as a public school math teacher. We can work on strengthening computational foundations (building a solid core of addition, subtraction, multiplication, division), as well as developing a comfort with mathematical notation and equation writing. I will work to develop a "math sense" in your child. Additionally, I can help with enrichment activities for more advanced students looking to take their classwork a little bit deeper. My rate is $70/hour, I live in north Berkeley, and I am available to travel in the East Bay. I will happily travel to your house, or another location of your choice (library, coffee shop, etc.) If you are interested, please let me know your tutoring needs (such as grade level, subject matter) and location. I look forward to hearing from you.

This is not strictly related to SAT or math, but it sort of is, so bear with me a sec. I've known…read moreWes for years, but until today he'd never "formally" taught me anything. He spent an hour today helping me learn to play the drums, and it was probably the most effective hour of instruction about *anything* I've ever had. And that's including 15 years of piano lessons, 6 years of clarinet/saxophone, and all kinds of other things I'd spent time trying to learn over the years. Why? The process sounds simple. First, he spent some time to figure out what I knew and didn't know. Second, he zeroed in on the areas where I was having problems, and broke them into a lot of smaller pieces. Third, he gave me concrete things to do to make each of those individual pieces easier to understand, and easier to practice. Fourth, he showed me how to start recombining those pieces, after practice, so I could fit the puzzle back together again having improved each individual piece. It *sounds* simple, but I think in practice it's quite difficult for most people to do in a way that feels constructive, positive, and encouraging. At each step, I felt like I was given the tools I needed to continue working on this on my own, and a clear path to improvement. I've been poking around trying to learn how to play the drums for a few years. In an hour, I learned more, and built up my capacity to learn more, than I would ever have imagined. Utterly spectacular. I think if you've got the chance to learn from Wes, regardless of the subject, you should take it. If you have a kid who's looking to learn math, or test prep, his approach is what I *wish* my teachers did when I was younger. It'd have helped me love the process of learning, not just focus on the test in front of me. Fantastic.

When it comes to virtual teaching, Wes Carroll is brilliant. In fact, he is so helpful that even…read moreother educators continue to benefit from his tutelage. As a teacher, Wes knows his audience and is always enthusiastic about the subject matter. In addition, he not only offers well-organized online courses but also video-conference tutoring. As one who has witnessed one of Wes's virtual sessions, I have seen how his expertise with technology can reach multiple students and help them remotely.

I highly recommend Alice Chen as a college admissions consultant. We met Alice when my son was in…read more10th grade. When we first met her, we knew she was the right person to help our son with his college application. She planned everything ahead and kept my son on track with all the application processes. She was always creative and shared new ideas from different aspects of the applications. She was tireless in her enthusiasm and generous with her time, especially during the holiday season. She gave my son the most considerable support. The competition is fierce for Asian male engineering students, and she helped my son create the strongest application possible. My son has already been accepted into an Ivy League university and another Top 10 University. She is an outstanding mentor - she works not just on the essay but on developing the potential of each of her students.

I am very grateful to have worked with Alice throughout the college application process!…read more Before I met Alice, I felt very unsure and stressed with deadlines, having gone through many different ideas/drafts for my essays. By asking specific questions and providing prompts for thinking, she helped bring my writing to life. In addition to providing advice/direction, she also always eased my stress and was a pleasure to talk with. With Alice's feedback, I was able present my best self to my colleges, helping me get accepted into my top choice school early.

I absolutely love Sra. Maca!! My kids are second generation born in the United States. And like…read moremany 2nd generations the language starts to die down. My kids understand Spanish but have trouble speaking back. So with Sra. Maca, she takes her time and has lots of patience to correct the boys when they get stuck on words that are hard to pronounce. She has definitely helped our kids speak more and for that we are greatful. We continue to reinforce Spanish in our home but it's a big help to have someone teach our kids in a class setting. We have been with her for about 3 months now and will continue with her !

Maca is brilliant, a gifted natural teacher. She is able to engage my 2 wild boys in 45min lessons…read moretwice a week, and they love her! She makes Spanish fun and rewarding, AND she holds them to high standards of grammatical correctness, pronunciation, and expanding vocabulary. I'm forever grateful and in admiration of Maca's skill.

Tilden Prep has been transformative for our son, who's twice exceptional. It offers greater depth…read moreand breadth of curriculum and more highly educated staff than its competitors, like Fusion Academy. For example, Tilden offers Multivariable Calculus and Linear Algebra. While such courses are offered at a community college, having the option to learn 1:1 is critical in giving a student a more solid foundation before entering a 4-year college. At the same time, the rates make more sense than Fusion Academy, which is on a trimester system and 30% more. Tilden is run like a school rather than a corporation. It's more pure to its cause. Good job Tilden. Keep up the good work!

Our son had a great experience at Tilden. He is very bright but struggled to organize his thoughts…read moreand get them down on paper. We enrolled him in English 9 at Tilden and had him take the rest of his classes in his public high school. His Tilden teacher, Dave Locey, helped him learn the steps of writing and feel good about his progress and talents. He said Mr. Locey was the best teacher he'd had :). He wanted to get ahead in math (because the common core track forced him to take math slowly with a lot of boring repetition) so we enrolled him in Geometry through Tilden over the summer. Even though he could have taken Geometry online for less money, we felt the one-on-one instruction and monitored pacing and instruction helped him stay on track and thus made it more likely he'd succeed. He got through the course very quickly and is now starting Algebra 2 at his HS so he'll be able to take Calculus before he graduates. His Tilden math teacher was also very knowledgeable and positive.