CRAIG GEHRING, 28
Founder and president, MasteryPrep
Who better to write the book on mastering standardized tests than the guy who made perfect scores on the ACT and SAT while a junior at Baton Rouge Magnet High School? Craig Gehring is the founder of MasteryPrep, a provider of ACT preparation materials and services. In just 18 months, the company has grown from three employees to more than 70. His plan for 2015? Going national.
Inspiring book: Think and Grow Rich
It’s an oldie but a goodie, particularly the first hundred pages. It’s a book that’s very hard to finish. You hit a point where you are so inspired and energized that you have to put it down and go out there and get stuff done!
Major professional accomplishments: Developer of the ACT Mastery program, which is designed to help schools boost the ACT scores of the students who most need help. ACT Mastery has been adopted by over 400 schools throughout the country. Made perfect scores on the ACT and the SAT while a junior at Baton Rouge Magnet High School. Founder of MasteryPrep, provider of the ACT Mastery materials and services, which has grown from three employees to over seventy in 18 months. One of the nation’s foremost experts on ACT test preparation.
Volunteer and community involvement: Baton Rouge Youth Coalition and GRAD’s STAR Program
PROFESSIONAL
When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? The mayor of SimCity. Also, a teacher.
What was your first job, and what did you learn from it? One of my first jobs was working for my dad. I cleaned windows for ICI Building Services, and buffed the floor of the Wal-Mart Neighborhood Market on Coursey before any racks were in it. I learned that Wal-Marts have a lot of square footage, that windows can take some serious scrubbing, and that there can be an amazing satisfaction in a hard job well done.
What is your favorite place for a business lunch in Baton Rouge? Portobello’s. Although I enjoyed it even more when they had the Cilantro Jack Salad on the menu.
What do you consider your greatest achievement? My three beautiful, amazing daughters. Although I must admit that God and my wife did most of the work. My girls give me a tremendous amount of hope and excitement for the future and I always look forward to the next day unfolding so I can be part of them growing into young ladies. I’m a proud dad.
The old saying goes, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” Specifically, what are you “being” to make Baton Rouge better? Baton Rouge is an amazing place and I’m so glad that I can raise my family here. I had great educational opportunities as a student at Shenandoah Elementary, Westdale Middle, and Baton Rouge High, and I’m driven to help students in Baton Rouge and throughout the country get a great education in whatever small way I can. So you could say I’m living, sleeping, breathing my job at MasteryPrep to help Baton Rouge as I know how.
What ritual do you do to get pumped up before a big meeting, presentation or pitch? I’ll clear my mind and try to be totally in the present. I’m a chronic multi-tasker, and my brain is always flipping to a hundred things in as many seconds, so it’s a bit of a process, like swiping to close all of my apps on my iPhone. I try to get so clearheaded I’m not even thinking about the meeting coming up, and then I go in.
What has been the most fulfilling moment in your career so far? It seems that every week we get in another amazing story from a student or school that has been touched by MasteryPrep. The most recent are always the most fulfilling, until the next moment happens. I think the most fulfilling moment recently was when we helped a dozen students in Florida graduate high school who would have been stuck without a high school diploma if they hadn’t done our test prep program.
What was your professional aha moment? The first student I ever tutored on the ACT needed to get the TOPS scholarship. I helped her get there. At that moment, I was hooked on ACT prep.
How many times will you try something before admitting it doesn’t work? At least half a time. I drive people crazy sometimes because I get very excited and decided about doing an idea, but switch to just as excited and decided about NOT doing it if it doesn’t work out.
What is your best productivity hack? OneNote and to-do lists. Also, travel. You can get so much work done in a hotel.
What did you learn the hard way? One great employee is worth the same pay as three good employees or ten disinterested or unqualified employees. We have a great team at MasteryPrep, and to keep the team great we can’t take shortcuts on our personnel process. In the interview process, you can usually tell when you have an amazing fit for your company in front of you. When that isn’t there, you have to say no, even when you need someone to fill that position yesterday.
TECHNOLOGY
Mac or PC? Microsoft Surface Pro 3. PC. The way it was meant to be. Yes. I am a nerd.
What’s your preferred mode of communication: text or phone call? Phone calls. I travel a lot and can get a lot done on the phone while I’m on the road.
How low will you allow your remaining battery life to get (in %) before you have an anxiety attack? Dead. I never believe it will die. And it’s always quite surprising when it does.
How many unread messages are in your inbox right now? Zero. Wait…two. Ahh, zero again. I was worried there for a second.
What app gets you through the day? OneNote. I do everything on OneNote. Planning, research, note taking, writing. It’s the bomb.
Are you quick to adapt to new tech, or did you hang on to that flip phone way after it became obsolete? I am a tech junkie. I try to convince my wife to let me go into Best Buy and leave the kids in the car with her every time I see its giant yellow tag. I am constantly using my wife’s phone upgrade eligibility. I am an AT&T Next customer, which is basically a program where they’re like, “Yeah, so you pay us full price for a phone every year, and we’ll give you a new phone!” I think that says it all. But if Apple made a flip phone next, I would definitely buy it.
PERSONALITY
How many times do you hit the snooze button? I usually wake up 15 seconds before the alarm rings. But that never works if I don’t set the alarm. I think there is some sort of undiscovered scientific principle there waiting for a Nobel Prize.
Breakfast at home? Breakfast on the go? Breakfast at your desk? No breakfast at all? Breakfast meetings. And Chik-fil-a breakfast on Sunday. But they’re always closed on Sundays. One of the cruelest facts of life.
Is the glass half empty or half full? What’s in the glass? Overflowing. If your glass is half empty, you got too big a glass. It is full of coffee.
What’s your motto? Keep moving forward. Beat expectations. Beat expectations by always moving forward.
When did you realize you had grown up? When I started looking forward to naps again.
Which living person do you most admire? Bill Gates. The work that he does through his foundation is simply mind-blowing. You can tell he is a very sincere person who is working to make a real difference on a massive scale.
What is your greatest extravagance? I go out with my family to eat way too much and spend an amazing amount of my money for my kids to eat macaroni and cheese, while my wife and I talk about how we have to stop going out to eat because we’re spending way too much money for our kids to eat macaroni and cheese.
If you could choose your age forever, what age would you choose and why? 28 has been pretty great. I hope that I don’t have too many years that I wouldn’t choose forever.
On what occasion do you lie? Only on this question.
Which talent or superpower would you most like to have and why? If I could be Insomnia Man, that would be very cool. Able to work without sleep for days on end!
If you worked for the CIA and needed a top-secret alias, what would yours be? Bald Eagle. See photo.
If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? Being healthier. It’s very easy for me to not exercise, eat junk, and just work, work, work. If I get tired or stressed, the last thing I want to do is work out and eat healthy, even though if I worked out and ate healthier I’d be less tired and stressed.
What’s your most treasured possession? I don’t treasure possessions. I’ve tried to. I’m not very good at it: stuff gets old to me too fast. I treasure relationships, people, accomplishments, moments. I treasure most of all my wife and my girls.
If you could live anywhere on this planet and take everything that you love with you, where would you choose to live and why? Destin. If I could take Baton Rouge, put a bay on one side, the Gulf on the other, line it with bleach white beaches, and fill it with a permanent salty breeze, I definitely would.
What do you most value in your friends? Loyalty, honesty, humor.
What do you miss most about the ’90s? Cargo pants. Now that I’m 28 in the year 2014, there’s so much more stuff I’m expected to carry around with me: phone, wallet, keys, other keys, pen, flash drive … it’s endless. Just when you finally need cargo pants, the fashion police take them away from you!
If you had to be a teacher of something, what would you teach? Umm, I don’t know. Maybe the ACT?
What is your theme song? If I’m trying to get pumped, Foo Fighters, Everlong. Get pumped.
Who would play you in a movie? I would want to be played by Bruce Willis. That is one bad bald dude. I would probably be played by Jonah Hill.
If you could go back in time 20 years, what advice would you give yourself? Eight-year-old Craig: Sure, you’re horribly geeky, but don’t listen to those kids who make fun of you. Or the kid with the particularly pointy cowboy boots who enjoys kicking your shins. One day you’ll have a lovely family with kids of your own who enjoy kicking your shins.
What useless piece of information will you never forget? A monologue from The Glass Menagerie that I did back in eighth grade. Also, why do middle school students perform Tennessee Williams plays? Maybe your next 40 can answer that one.
Who’s the most famous celebrity you’ve ever met? Jared Loftus.
LOOKING AHEAD
What’s the next challenge you have planned? In 2015, we are working to build a national company, to go from a regional to a national player in our niche. It’s going to be quite a challenge to pull together the talent and make it happen, and our entire team is excited about the opportunity to do so.
If you have children, what concerns you most about the future they will inherit? Part of what drives me to work in education and to help students exceed expectations and access opportunities is that I know that students MasteryPrep helps will do better in school, which will translate into them doing better in life, and that helps create a better environment for my girls. Who knows? Maybe my future grandkids’ pediatrician will be a student who MasteryPrep helped get into college.
Do you plan to be in the Capital Region five years from now? Absolutely. Baton Rouge is home.
Why have you chosen to make your home in the Capital Region? Baton Rouge has a lot going for it. It’s a great place to raise kids. It’s a great place for business. Almost all of my family is here, and family is very important to me.
Have you peaked, or do you think you’ll still have it when we launch our hypothetical “Forty Over 40” awards years from now? I sure do hope I haven’t peaked.
