UMBC student Pricing
Only for UMBC students: special Up to 40% off pricing on tutoring/coaching rates
Hello! I am a UMBC alum (B.S. Chemistry, 2015) who moved on to conduct research and teach at The Ohio State University (Ph.D. Organic Chemistry, 2021). For the better half of the last decade, I have been supporting students through their general and organic chemistry courses by providing not only expert-level teaching experience (>1500 hundred hours and counting), but also by being highly proactive and dedicated to each of my students in a way that University-based support struggles to provide.
I am thrilled to collaborate with UMBC’s Chemistry Department to bring the highest quality support to chemistry students!
Scroll through this UMBC landing page to see info about what makes My Chem Mentor special, your student pricing, my background, and how to reach out.
How it works
My Chem Mentor is a fully virtual service that works via an online whiteboard. Think of it as Notability meets Google Docs meets Zoom. When you are ready to reach out, here is how the process will go:
Step 1. CONTACT - Click HERE or scroll down and fill out the contact form letting me know you want to learn more.
Step 2. CONSULT - I will email you to schedule a brief phone call (~15 min). On the call, I will introduce myself, ask a few basic questions to understand your needs, and then explain scheduling and payment.
Step 3. READ - You will receive a follow-up email with some additional information and links to my scheduler, your board, and a google drive folder to share materials for our session.
Step 4. SCHEDULE/PAY - Select dates for sessions using the provided link to my scheduler. You will then receive an invoice for the session. Once payment is received, the session reservation is complete.
Step 5. PREP - We will work together to determine what content to cover, then get everything added to the Drive folder in preparation for the session.
Step 6. LEARN - Meet me on your private board for our session!
Why Choose My Chem Mentor?
Chemistry can deeply challenging to learn and requires significant time spent studying. For some students, studying can devolve into aimlessly flipping through notes or growing frustrated at answer keys with no explanations. Most frustrating of all, you may sit down with the intention of completing a problem set only to find you don’t even know how to approach the problem in the first place. In these cases, seeking help is critical to prevent falling behind or burning out from over-studying.
You may wonder: with free options like office hours, drop-in tutoring at the Chem Tutorial Center, and external resources like YouTube, why would students choose My Chem Mentor?
Office hours can naturally make some students feel intimidated, even with professors like Dr. Carpenter and Dr. Gierasch. Those that do show up may find their office packed with students (especially around exam time) because they know experienced educators can best explain the concepts. If you are a commuter off campus that day, you may have to drive in just for the chance to get a few questions answered. Even worse, if another course overlaps with their office hours, you lose it as a resource entirely even if you are on campus!
While drop-in tutoring can be helpful, it can often be difficult to get enough help from TAs that are managing many students at the same time. As a result, your immediate questions may get answered, but you may not feel you have necessarily learned much because there was no guided learning from an experienced educator and you received less feedback than you may need due to lack of sustained attention.
Free resources, particularly those on YouTube, are extremely valuable resources! They are generally well-structured, available whenever you need them, and you can go at your own pace. That said, these videos end, and once they do, you have no additional practice to be guided through. Having relatively few examples to work through prevents you from building strategies to approach more complex exam-style problems. This often translates to better homework/quiz performance, but poor exam grades.
My Chem Mentor offers the support of an experienced Ph.D. educator dedicated to helping you find success by providing ample feedback, accessibility, and flexibility, all on a platform you can use anywhere.
Private & Group Sessions
Private tutoring/coaching is ideal for those looking to receive focused, sustained help at their individual pace. We will work together on a virtual whiteboard to cover concepts, practice problems, and study strategies critical to success in your course. Need feedback on practice outside of your sessions? Email anytime for hints, explanations, and clarifications to keep you on track!
Have a study group and want to get more out of it? Use group sessions to stay focused and make real progress while we work through problems and concepts in a relaxed atmosphere. Besides being more cost-effective, group studying can be more engaging and lead to a wider perspective as you hear how other students approach problems.
About Dr. Eric Wolfson
I am a scientific professional with a PhD in organic chemistry who, for the better half of the last decade, has been woefully unsuccessful at stepping away from teaching. After graduating from The Ohio State University, I entered into industry R&D and believed my tutoring days to be behind me. It quickly became apparent they were, in fact, not. As it turned out, the passion and joy I felt around helping my students understand an often frustrating subject drew me back each and every semester. Now, I have transitioned to teaching full-time to support even more students through their chemistry learning experience.
When you work with me, you can expect exceptional care and a genuine dedication to your success as a student. I strongly value being accessible by email to answer your questions, being flexible to adapt to your schedule, and being a champion of your success both inside and outside of the classroom.