about us

Founder

Julia Trees Kem began Illuminance Tutoring in 2018 in the pursuit to help students reach their academic goals and achieve a lifelong love of learning.  

Julia found her passion for tutoring while at UCLA when she was volunteering to help children learn to read as well as helping high school students learn financial literacy.  She decided to pursue her passion of helping students learn after successfully completing her Bachelor's degree in Financial Actuarial Math and passing the FM and P actuarial exams in March 2019. 

Her passion for learning languages and helping others do the same led her to receive her teaching certificate for teaching English as a second language (TESOL) in March 2023.  With over a year of experience tutoring ESL to elementary aged learners, she has helped students with reading, writing, speaking, listening and pronunciation in English.  She enjoys teaching English through having her students read nonfiction children stories to learn about other subjects such as history, art or science.  She also plays games with the children to help them become comfortable with practicing speaking and listening. 

Over the years, she has seen an increasing need for tutoring assistance ranging from grades K-12.  With increasing standards, students find themselves in more need of assistance to keep up in a competitive school environment.  She sees that each student learns at a different pace and begins by meeting the student at their current level of understanding to help them build their confidence.  From a young age, students can be grouped into levels, which can be detrimental to their confidence and their overall interest in the subject.  Julia aims to help students see that through practice they can grow and not only reach their current grade level material but also surpass it.  She enjoys making learning fun and appealing while also assessing the students to measure their progress over time from where they began. 

Through working with over 100 students, she has observed each student's personality and how that affects their learning style.  Each student has different academic goals whether they need clarification from what is being taught in the classroom or they are unstimulated by school because it is not provoking a challenge for them.  She sees each child is gifted with the ability to achieve anything they desire, and her goal is to help students realize their potential and to gain motivation through relating concepts in a relevant way to their age group or interests.  She tailors her lessons to meet the individual needs of the students and aims to create a fun and engaging learning environment to show them the relevance of their subjects in the real world.  

Since 2018, Illuminance Tutoring has been helping students gain confidence, increase grades, and spark inspiration for a lifelong love of learning.  We are so excited that you are here and we are looking forward to hearing how we can best assist you in achieving your academic goals!