Dan might be a Hawaii boy at heart — he was born and raised in Honolulu — but his love for storytelling, especially the way the Greeks and Romans did it, has taken him across the globe. After studying Greek and Latin at NYU, he went on to Oxford and won the university’s most competitive scholarship in the humanities as the first Ertegun Scholar in Ancient History. Post-Oxford, Dan taught history, writing, and Latin at Bard Early College, and he is now finishing up his PhD at Princeton. Alongside his studies, Dan works closely with students on college essays, literature (close reading and analysis, especially), research skills, and, of course, Latin. He has now mentored more than 60 high schoolers and has proudly helped them earn spots at schools like Princeton, Harvard, Emory, Northwestern, Rice, Penn, Cornell, USC, and Michigan.

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Above all, Dan is an intellectual mentor. One of his greatest strengths is helping his students elevate their college essays so they fully convey the intellectual growth and sophistication they have earned through their hard work. However, he takes his role as his students’ advocate just as seriously (while still somehow being pretty silly, too). He remembers and appreciates how stressful and overwhelming high school and the whole college process can be, and he takes a lot of joy in being the kind, reliable, trustworthy source of support that students and families need through this process. At every stage, he is thinking very carefully about how to position his students to succeed.

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When Dan isn’t teaching, he’s usually doing one of a few things: surfing, trying to break his bench press PR, translating Latin poetry, and writing in his journal. He has also traveled extensively and, by age 30, had visited every capital in Europe, including several he would not recommend for summer vacation or for any vacation for that matter.