Tongue planted firmly in cheek, David Zook calls himself the Anthony Bourdain of Education.
David’s professional career started even before his graduation from college when he did a semester abroad in Japan, got a teaching position and ended up staying in Japan for nearly 12 years!!! After teaching English and Math for 6 years, he taught himself how to program then transitioned into a marketing job in the software industry. After spending 10 years in the software industry, David returned to teaching, this time as a tutoring center owner. Over the next 15 years he and his staff have tutored over 5,000 students in virtually all academic subjects.
Over the years, David developed a new vision of what works and what doesn’t work in education, he has dubbed Awesome Schooling that incorporates all the sources of education available to US students to achieve a customized, motivating, challenging high school experience for EVERY child. Based on this vision of diverse resources being coordinated to provide customized yet challenging education, David founded Big Brains Preparatory. The BBP educational experience is built around online curriculum, flexible hours, tutorial-based learning, Passion Projects and an Honor Code
In 2001 David, along with his son Zane, gathered a team of 3rd graders to compete in First Lego League. After finishing 13th in Washington State and then 7th the next year, Mindstorm Masters won the state championship and went to the World Championships where they won 1st for Project. After that Mindstorm Masters and then WASABI Robotics both became among the winningest robotics teams in the world, winning two world championships in FLL, one World and one US Open in VEX, multiple state championships and dozens of wins and recognitions in local tournaments.
In 2012, David was asked to teach a Robotics and Physics program for gifted kids at the Robinson Center at the University of Washington. The following year he helped expand that program to include an introductory program for younger students which has been taught by WASABI Alumni, Zane Zook and Jinda Rosmann. Both programs are among the most popular summer programs at the Robinson Center.
Finally, in 2014, David, along with former student Amulya Deva, authored 3 books of CogAT (Cognitive Abilities Test) test prep material. Leveraging his 15 years of experience with coaching kids on this test, the books have been steady sellers on Amazon nationwide..