Hi, I'm Hesam (Sam) Samimi.
Computer Scientist-turned-Teacher from California
Now
I am a teacher of computer science and programming, as well as an independent K-12 curriculum developer, teaching and developing project-based learning curriculums for secondary K-12 schools and online learning platforms since 2017. I have a Career Technical Education teaching credential from CA, USA. I'm also an ESL english teacher, a web & mobile app developer, and a yoga & meditation instructor.
I've recently launched Termeric, which is an online buy-and-sell marketplace for K-12 school subject teacher curriculums.
Before discovering my passion at the crossroads of computers and teaching, I spent seven years during and after my Ph.D. studies at UCLA as a programming languages researcher, focusing on the application of artificial intelligence in programming and software development.
My Story
I grew up in Iran and moved to southern CA, US with my family after high school. I moved up to northern CA to finish my undergraduate degree from UC Berkeley at 2005, then worked in Silicon Valley industry as a software engineer for a couple of years. In 2007 I moved back down to southern CA to finish my Ph.D. in Computer Science at UCLA, which came in 2013.
2007 I loved all the 6 years of graduate school at UCLA Computer Science dept., as much as I had hated undergraduate years at Berkeley!
My computer science work was on the application of AI tools for computer programming and programming languages. I continued this work as an academic researcher for another few years.
2014 A Demo of My Work: Sketchpad14 - Bridge under Wind
In 2015 I got an urge to switch my career and life path to focus more on yoga and yoga philosophy, after becoming a follower of the teachings of the great yogi Yogananda. This event eventually moved me back up to northern CA where I was to live for threes years in an intentional community of other followers of this teaching in the foothills of Sierra Nevada. There I received my yoga and meditation teacher training, while I delved deeper into the teachings and practiced bringing them to my daily life.
2015 I moved to an intentional community with other followers of Paramhansa Yogananda
2015 Sam the yoga teacher
2015 Sam the meditation teacher
As it happened, while there I made a return to my software life, when I was asked to create a meditation app. This eventually lit a spark in me to teach my craft to others. I applied my knowledge of programming and experience in software development to create a Udemy online course. Later in 2017 I found an opportunity to teach programming and computer science part-time in the secondary school in the community where I lived.
2016 My courses on Udemy. The first course I created on Udemy was Introduction to Programming and App Development
In 2018 I was ready to go full-time as computer teacher. At the same time I felt it was time to leave the simple life of the intentional community and make it back to the "real-world." Being inspired by a friend who was looking into teaching English abroad, I looked into computer teaching jobs outside of US and landed on an opportunity to work as a curriculum developer in a K-12 technology education company in Thailand. After working there for about a year, I took a full-time computer/ESL teaching position in a school in north-east of Thailand, as part of their international program, where I would stay for two years. This was the funnest job I've ever done.
2020 Teaching in Thailand amid Covid19!
2020 One of my students in Thailand drew a typical scene in my classes!
While there I met a girl, married, and had a baby son! In 2021 we made it back to CA to live back in the USA. Here I am working on a CTE teacher credential program, which should help me learn a few more things about the teaching trade and obtain a computer teacher job. Aside from classroom teaching, independently creating curriculum for K-12 education of computer science has become my speciality.
2021 Back in US with a family!
In 2021 I launched a new kind of buy-and-sell teacher curriculum marketplace website called Termeric, with a focus on structure, completeness, and quality. For now I'm creating and placing my own teacher curriculums there for sale and hope that other teachers can soon discover it too!
2021 I launched the Termeric website after working on it for 9 months. I continue to develop and maintain it, while also creating and posting curriculums there.
To get in touch, please see my web page. Thanks!