Your Tutors
Nat Crawford
President and Owner
Nat C. is the President of Improve Your English. He received his BA in English Literature from The University of Chicago and his MA at Stanford University. For four years, he taught writing and Honors English at an elite preparatory school in Los Altos. As a teacher and tutor, he has helped students develop better writing skills, improve scores on standardized tests, and earn admission to top colleges, including Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Yale, Berkeley, and many more.
Dr. Mary Lynn W.
PhD, UCLA
Dr. Mary Lynn W. graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz with a double major in English and History. She holds both an MA in Medieval European History and a PhD in Indo-European Studies from UCLA. She is a lecturer at San Jose State University, where she has taught mandatory junior-level writing courses for ten years. Dr. W. has studied 13 languages, including French, German, Latin, and Sanskrit.
Dr. Julie S.
PhD, Penn State University
For over 25 years, Dr. Julie S. has taught English at the university level while also tutoring a wide variety of students, always with a focus on helping them excel at writing essays and understanding literature. While earning her Ph.D. in English at Penn State University, Dr. S. tutored in the PSU writing center and taught classes in freshman rhetoric and composition, junior-level business and technical writing, British literature, and an honors class in utopian and dystopian literature. She has also taught world literature, modern and contemporary drama, and Shakespeare. After Penn State, Dr. S. returned to her roots in the Bay Area to teach various classes in composition, critical thinking, and literature as a lecturer at San Jose State University for over 14 years. Her philosophy of both teaching and tutoring can be summed up in a line from the great Irish poet W. B. Yeats: “Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire.”
Dr. Scott S.
PhD, University of London
Scott S. is an experienced and versatile tutor, teacher, university lecturer, and examiner, with over a decade of teaching experience and a PhD in English Literature from University of London (United Kingdom). During over a decade as an English tutor, Dr. Scott has taught English to hundreds of middle and high school students. He has taught individuals and small groups, both face-to-face and online. His tutoring experience includes teaching for four years at the Royal Holloway in the UK. In his role as Assistant Professor of English at Chongshin University in Seoul, South Korea, he has designed, taught and examined courses for undergraduate students.
Dr. Diane G.
PhD, Case Western Reserve University
With a PhD in English from Case Western Reserve University, Dr. Diane G. has over 30 years invested in teaching Composition and Literature courses at the high school and university level. She started her career in education by teaching for four years at the Hawken Private School while studying for her PhD. After completing her degree, she moved on to teach for over 10 years at Allegheny College. She then taught for five years at the prestigious Ransom Everglades School in Florida, where she helped to send nearly all of her students to top American colleges. Her faculty evaluations describe her as a teacher who cares tremendously about her students and works hard to give them the best chance of success.
Patrick P.
MA, University of Calgary; BA, UC Santa Cruz
Patrick P. is currently working on a Ph.D. in English Literature at the University of Calgary, where he also completed an M.A. in English Literature. He received his B.A. in Literature with honors from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Patrick has assisted students for many years both at the secondary and post secondary level with academic essay writing, critical reading, and textual analysis. Patrick is passionate about education, literature, and travel and seeks to add an element of self-discovery to the learning process by encouraging critical dialogue and reflection.
Daniel S.
MA, UPenn
Daniel S. holds a B.A. in History and French from Amherst College in Massachusetts (according to the 2020 US News & World Report on America’s Top Colleges, Amherst College is ranked #2 in National Liberal Arts Colleges, #12 in Best Undergraduate Teaching and #3 in Best Value Schools, with an acceptance rate of 12.9%). Daniel went on to earn a master’s degree in French literature at the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League school with an acceptance rate of 9.3%. Having passed all of IYE’s tests and completed the company training, Daniel started tutoring for IYE part-time in 2018, where he has tutored students from all academic levels. He graduated from Pinewood School in Los Altos, one of the few schools in the country that gives students a strong background in English grammar. This gave Daniel an advantage both when he was applying to Ivy League schools and when he took the IYE tutor test. Daniel loves to read classic literature and to share with students the joys of focused reading, and stronger comprehension of the English language. Since his graduation from University of Pennsylvania, Daniel has worked as a 5th grade teacher for three years in San Jose, developed his ESL teaching skills by teaching English abroad in a small town in the French Alps, and, for the last two years, taught at Challenger School.
Mirabella M.
BA, Princeton; MFA, University of Virginia
Mirabella M. has a bachelor’s degree in English from Princeton University and an MFA in creative writing from the University of Virginia. She taught college-level composition and creative writing at UVA, where she also worked as a writing tutor for undergraduate and graduate students. Now an SAT and English tutor, she focuses on building critical thinking and writing skills. Her own writing has received numerous awards and been published in several literary magazines.
Julie S.
MFA, San Jose State
Julie S. holds a Master’s Fine Arts in Creative Writing from San Jose State University, where she taught freshman composition and tutored in the writing center while earning her degree. She has also taught grammar and essay writing to a range of K-12 students and has led creative writing workshops, as well. She loves helping students learn how to best express themselves and their ideas, in both essays and in stories. When she’s not teaching, she can often be found reading or spending time with her own teenagers before they head off to college.
David M.
BA, UC Santa Cruz
David M. earned a B.A. with a double major in modernist literature and American history from U.C. Santa Cruz, from which he graduated with honors. He began his ten years of work in education by teaching U.S. history in college classrooms, where he often transformed ‘C’ students into ‘A’ students. He is currently in the process of writing and editing several novels in preparation for publication. Since 2012, he has tutored elementary and middle school children, with a particular emphasis on encouraging an early appreciation of classic and world literature.
Carol S.
BA, UC Davis
With 18 years of teaching experience in the Bay Area, Carol S. is an experienced and accomplished educator. She began her studies with a degree in English from UC Davis and continued by receiving a Masters in TESOL from San Jose State, as well as a teaching credential from Notre Dame de Namur. Reflecting her strong subject knowledge, Carol is to date the only IYE tutor applicant to have received a 100% score on the IYE tutor grammar test. In addition, as a teacher in the Silver Creek school district, she received high commendations for her classroom management and rapport with students. Carol also enjoys music, having performed in a variety of local choirs.
Judy W.
BA, UC Berkeley
Judy W. graduated from U.C. Berkeley with a B.A. in English Literature. After obtaining two teaching credentials, she went on to graduate study in English, in education, and in ancient languages and literature. Her experience includes private schools, public schools, supplemental education, and homeschools. She has taught reading comprehension, literary analysis, grammar, writing, and the structure of language to all ages, including adults. She has additional expertise in Gifted Education and in the writing aspects of college admissions, having also worked independently as a college admissions counselor.
Matthew H.
BA, UC Berkeley
Matthew Hoyt graduated from UC Berkeley with a BA in comparative literature, concentrating in English and French literature. After college, he took a degree from The New School for Social Research, where he obtained a MA in liberal studies. His coursework for his MA consisted of classes in both literature and philosophy, and his MA thesis focused on 20th-century American poetry. His fifteen years of work in education comprises tutoring students in reading comprehension, grading assignments for and collaborating with community college instructors, and working full time as a classroom teacher for four years. At Improve Your English, he enjoys cultivating a love of reading in his students while helping them raise their grades and test scores.
Daniel H.
BA, Santa Clara University
Daniel H. received his B.A. in English from Santa Clara University. He has several years of experience with assisting students at the elementary, middle, and high school levels while helping them make significant strides in enriching their literacy and comprehension skills. His life-long love of reading and writing, supplemented by the study of literature in college, has given him a passion to impart a similarly ardent appreciation to others. His dedication, along with superb organization in lesson preparation and progression, inspires students to strive for excellence.