Could you introduce yourself? Your major, interests, anything you’d like to share?

I’m David. I’m a junior in the College. I major in Economics, and I minor in Middle Eastern Studies and Philosophy. I was born and raised in LA, and now I’m at Penn.

Do you want to share a little bit about your experience at Penn and the clubs or roles you’ve been involved in?

I’m very much a people person. I love engaging with people. I love giving tours for Penn, and I do that every week. I also love tutoring with Weingarten because I get to sit down and help students really think through and go through the material for class in an intuitive way, which I really like. I’m also involved with Under the Button, which is our school satire paper, so I get to write satire, which I think is fun. I’m involved in the Wharton Alliance, which is our queer club on campus for representation in corporate spaces. We put on a big consulting case every year. We just had ours a few weeks ago, which was successful. I’m also involved in various communities. I’m Persian Jewish, so I’m involved with the Penn Persian society. It was just our Persian New Year, so we had a big event, which was great. I’m also involved with a lot of the Jewish spaces. We host events for Jewish holidays. Passover is coming up, and we’re hosting some events for it. I live in a Jewish house, so we host events there as well.

Which courses are you tutoring right now? And do you have any study tips?

Great question. I currently tutor corporate finance and introductory corporate finance. Some tips I would give to other tutors: it’s most helpful to give really intuitive, real-world examples that can help students reapply what they’re learning to the real world and make it very conceptual. Once that’s established, understanding how that’s applied through the formulas being learned in class. I’m very much an intuitive visual learner. I like to imagine the scenario and then understand how the formula we’re learning maps onto that.

Do you have any experiences you’d like to share about tutoring?

One student came to me, and he was really struggling. It was really meaningful hearing him tell me how helpful it was to have this one-on-one with me. He had so many great questions, but felt a little intimidated to ask them in his large lecture class, and he felt much more confident in the material once he was able to go over them with me. That was during our first session. Since then, he’s booked me every week, and we routinely go over that week’s material. It was really moving because he has such a great mind and is really good at understanding the material. He just needed a more one-on-one learning experience, and I was really grateful I could provide it for him.

Do you have any advice for first-year students?

I would say, do not be shy about asking for help. It can seem intimidating, and if there’s a moment where you feel like you could use additional support, it exists, and you should use it. It’s there for your benefit and to help you succeed. That’s what Penn wants. Penn wants its students to do well. So if you’re a freshman and you feel like you need some additional support system, please seek it out, because it’s there and we’re here to help.