Our Tutors - Gabriel Ledesma

Gabriel, Natural Sciences - University of Cambridge

Hi! I'm Gabriel, a recent BA and MSci Natural Sciences (Biochemistry) first-class graduate from Emmanuel College, Cambridge. I am passionate and greatly fulfilled by academia, finishing 8th in my final year, and I am about to embark on a PhD in Biomedicine at the Centre for Genomic Regulation in Barcelona, Spain. Prior to university, I attended state school and achieved eleven 9s at GCSE and four A*s in Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics, and English Literature at A-Level. An academic highlight of mine was my MSci research project where I worked on the fastidious bacterium Orientia tsutsugamushi which can only live and grow inside other cells - a cell within a cell!

I love tutoring because I enjoy the process of breaking down concepts and questions into first principles and fundamental skills shared across STEM subjects. I've done this both as a tutor and as an editor and science communicator (I co-host Cambridge's BlueSci podcast and edit for three academic publications: MIT Science Policy Review, BlueSci Magazine, Cambridge University Science and Policy Exchange), so explaining complex material clearly and accurately is something I find incredibly satisfying! I also find tutoring to be as useful for the tutee as for the tutor and use this as a guiding principle to stretch students beyond the curriculum, finding ways to relate GCSE and A-Level content to ongoing research and novelties.

I've spent the last four years privately tutoring GCSE and A-Level Sciences and Maths (with a particular focus on Chemistry and Biology) and supporting students through Oxbridge and other competitive university applications through admissions test (ESAT) guidance, personal statement mentoring, and mock interviews based on the Cambridge Natural Sciences interview format. I was also briefly a mentor with Zero Gravity, working one-to-one with a student from an underrepresented background on both subject tutoring and their university application. I'm therefore happy to offer tuition in GCSE Physics, GCSE and A-Level Biology, Chemistry, and Maths, and university admissions mentoring and support.