Rafael is an undergraduate student at Johns Hopkins University pursuing a double major in Neuroscience and Biology under a pre-med track. Rafael attended Queens High School of the Sciences at York College, one of NYC’s specialized high schools, where he had a cumulative average of 100.08 and took 11 AP courses.
Rafael prides himself in his advocacy work. He collaborated with principal investigators from Yale and Johns Hopkins to conduct research on Food Insecurity in New York City during the COVID-19 pandemic. Their research was given an honorable mention in the ISL Symposium and has been presented to Queens Borough President Donovan Richards. Since then, he joined the Chinese-American Planning Council (CPC) to help enrich his community by organizing and supporting community events.
Rafael has extensive experience tutoring others. At 15 years old, he became a Teacher’s Assistant at Youth4AM, preparing middle schoolers for the SHSAT. His students saw a significant increase in their scores and greater access to one of New York’s Specialized High Schools. At 16 years old, he was a head counselor at an elementary school, where he was also a math teacher and mentor to his cohort. In his school, he’s part of Arista where he teaches underclassmen trigonometry, algebra, and chemistry. Being an avid chess geek, he also coaches chess in his school’s Chess Club. In regard to test taking, he achieved a near-perfect score on the SAT and ACT, as well as countless perfect 5’s on his AP tests. His approach to teaching is to let his students enjoy learning while becoming masters at the content. Rafael takes pride in being able to meet each student’s individual needs by adapting to what works and what doesn’t, ensuring his students leave with an advantage.
