9th November 2018 9:00
By Blue Tutors
Something we’ve written about before is the importance of tutors valuing the commitment made to a student when deciding to tutor them. This feels particularly relevant at this time of year because a number of our tutors are relatively new to tutoring, haven’t grasped how important their commitment is, and sometimes don’t take it as seriously as we expect.
Obviously if a tutor stops tutoring a student, or decides not to start at all, it means that we have to find another tutor, but this effort on our part is nothing compared to the effect on the student. If a tutor simply doesn’t begin lessons then the best case scenario is a 1 week delay for the student, sometimes longer, but even a week can make a big difference if the student has exams soon or needs reassurance about their studies.
The worst situation is where a tutor has begun lessons and chooses to stop at a really inconvenient time for the student. Either in the run up to exams or at a time when the majority of our tutors are so busy that they can’t take on anyone else, so the student is left struggling to find a replacement. The value of each lesson increases as tutor and student develop a relationship and understand each other better. Stopping after 20 weeks when the student wanted 30 weeks of lessons is so difficult. Yes, the student has had 20 good lessons, but that was on the understanding that there would be 30 in total, beginning a course of 10 lessons with another tutor feels like a real blow.
We appreciate that new tutors haven’t always had the experience to consider this idea. For many of them tutoring is an extra income stream; a part time job they think they’ll enjoy, but it’s different from many other part time jobs because the student feels that they are paying for a commitment as well as the actual time spent tutoring.
We’re asked all the time about what makes a good tutor, and obviously we emphasise the standard of teaching we expect, and that we want our tutors to be friendly and personable. Something which is less often thought about is this commitment, but we talk about it all the time. We want our tutors to feel invested in their students and understand how much they are relied upon.