John Kovacs
About Candidate
The best year of my life was when I was teaching in Beijing, China. I loved every second of that experience. Something about being surrounded by a language that I not only didn’t understand, but whose written language was completely unrecognizable to me. Culture shock is enriching no matter how you look at it. There was something magical about having to work through language barriers with my co-workers and students, or even people on the street. I found that the act of overcoming those barriers to achieve some goal (teaching, learning, explaining, coordinating, etc.) connects me to my own humanity in a very unique way. It made me a better person, and certainly a better teacher.
I have a lot of experience bringing joy and curiosity to the subject of Math, but I also have experience teaching English, and I know I can thrive while teaching it anywhere I go. Most of my teaching experience in the US was with a student population primarily consisting of English Language Learners (ELLs). As you can imagine, the district I was working for, as a whole, used TEFL principles in all classrooms as a norm. Needless to say, I have extensive experience with ELL students.
I started a very small company based in Michigan and my current client is the school district that I used to work for as a teacher. My company is an affordable way for schools to get more utility from their students’ standardized testing scores including WIDA, NWEA, (P)SAT, and any other standardized testing out there. This leads to school staff of all levels making higher quality data driven decisions regarding their students on a student-by-student basis with ease.
Education
Major: Mathematics Minor: Computer Science Specialization: Teaching
A 120 hour comprehensive TEFL program, which trains and successfully prepares students for the demands of an EFL classroom. In addition to Classroom Management and Teaching Skills, the course covers areas such as Testing, Lesson Planning, Placements, Media & Technology as well as intensive modules on Grammar and Other Language components.
Work & Experience
Taught 6th grade Math and 6th grade Math remediation. Co-coached the Cross Country Team & Track Distance Running Team. Founded the Chess Club.
Taught summer test prep for the English and Math portions of the SAT. Created spreadsheets which helped the team record their hours for payroll. Implemented positive reinforcement strategies and "gamified" lessons.
Taught conversational English to native Chinese speakers in Beijing. Collaborated on design of conversational English curriculum. Facilitated the school's English club.
Taught Algebra 1 and Algebra 1 remediation. Streamlined grading and weekly lesson plan generation with Google Spreadsheets and Google Apps Scripts saving myself 10 hours of classroom administration work per week while improving the quality of said work. Designed and implemented a system for student volunteers to teach the class.
Supplemented online courses with zoom instruction sessions for Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2 and Business Math.
Coordinated with clients to scope and develop small to large scale operational solutions. Built a product that aggregates and formats standardized test data saving school staff around 900 hours of work per year and creating utility for approximately 49,000 data points across approximately 4,200 students each year. Automated inventory management to save one client approximately 180 hours of work per year.
