A steady and long-term tutor is like having a regular doctor. Preventative medicine protects one from possible disease. In the same manner, tutors prevent academic dis-ease by lowering stress levels, academic anxiety, and ensuring that people feel confident about their learning experiences.
As a tutor, I have seen parents in panicked concern, students “freaking out,” and other situations that are uncomfortable, but essentially, preventable. Let’s take a more specific look into the matter.
Having a long-term tutor has many invaluable benefits:

1. Succeeding Feels Good – This is simple, obvious, and yet easily over-looked. Setting goals, impressing teachers and parents, and achieving respectable grades naturally boost self-esteem. It’s a better “Selling-point” to a wary student than the statement, “Getting good grades is essential for success.” The student may be eager to rebel and prove you wrong (as some parents know all too well). Bottom line: A consistent tutor helps students do well and feel good about their progress.

2. Preventing Loss of Confidence – It’s common for the struggling student to feel inadequate, ashamed, and possibly, “stupid.” I once tutored a student who had become very depressed and anxious after doing poorly in school. When discussing her grades, the mother asked me if she thought a psychiatrist would help. I didn’t feel like that was my business, but I did say that I have seen the personality of students open and shine once the good grades become consistent. This particular student’s transformation was unbelievable. After getting As and Bs on her tests, she became light-hearted, enthusiastic, and noticeably happy. I guess a creative tutor is better than anti-depressants!

3. Students Benefit from One-on-One Attention – This type of interaction is just not possible with the nature of our over-crowded school systems. I have worked with students that require specialized attention. ADD, autism, generalized anxiety, and other possible conditions have led me to students who really need special attention from an engaging tutor. One amazing individual, who has autism, made my day when he said, “I just want to be normal. Working with you makes it easier. Thanks Kevin.”

4. No More End-of-Semester Stressful Debacles – Many people have the tendency to wait until their son or daughter displays severe symptoms of academic distress before finding a tutor.
I was once hired to help a senior from failing Chemistry and Economics. There were 5 weeks left in the year and she was facing the possibility of not graduating. Of course, we didn’t let that happen. However, throughout, the student was miserably worried and the parents were very concerned. It turned into a rewarding situation. But believe me, it’s not worth the stress.

5. A New Perspective – Here’s one for the parents! Tutors have the ability to provide insights that no one else may be privy to. I’m 29 and students feel comfortable telling me that which they’d never tell their “old” or “mean” teacher. One 5th grade student accidentally cursed around me, and asked, “Are you going to tell my mom?” I responded, “Look. I don’t think it’s a good idea to curse, but hey, I’m no tattle tale!” The same day, this fifth grader opened up to me and told me why he was having problems in school. Of course, his mom appreciated the insight, I built trust with the student, and we still regularly work together.

6. Treating a Student as a Unique Individual – Rudolph Steiner, an advocate for better educational practice, once said:
“Love of the child is at the basis of all our educational endeavors, and that
all teaching is done through inner, living experience.”
(The New Essential Steiner, Robert McDermott, Lindisfarne Books, 2009, pg. 245)

I think Steiner is wisely suggesting that education needs to be tailored to each student’s particular interests, needs, and abilities. Tutors can teach to the unique individual. Learning is different for every person. A long-term tutor is a consistent resource that engages the student and brings life to the learning process. This make learning enjoyable. Ultimately, this is the source that fuels student progress, promotes future success, and reassures parents that their child is on the right track to a bright future.

Okay, it’s true! – Unlike a doctor, a tutor generally isn’t responsible for heavy life or death situations. However, as mentioned, a tutor can help make the life of a student (and the student’s parents) much simpler, more enjoyable, and less stressful.

I hope that all students, tutors, and parents alike are finding this to be the case.

I recently posed this question to our tutors in the hopes that one or two people would give me a unique insight into what makes TutorSource so special. What I got was overwhelming – I received so many fantastic responses that I’ve decided to share excerpts here, instead of the usual practice of dedicating a post to a single response.

Without further ado, these are some of the reasons that our tutors think you should hire a TutorSource tutor:

Judith Davis:
“It’s fast, easy, and effective. With our new website, it’s fast and easy to find a tutor in your area who tutors the subjects you need. With some tutoring companies, you have to search their website for the link you need, or you have to call and explain your request to someone who will try to find a tutor for you.

So, with TutorSource, you’re in charge- you don’t have to take a chance on someone who is assigned to you about whom you know little. With just one click, you can find a tutor yourself!"

Adam Gottlieb:
“A TutorSource Tutor has integrity. They manage themselves and hold themselves accountable for all of their own actions. If they perform poorly it directly affects their reputation and their livelihood, and decreases their status as a tutor. When a tutor has something so personal to protect, something so dire at stake, they are bound to give you the best tutoring experience possible. Isn’t that exactly what you want?”

Karen Lincoln:

“The reasons for hiring a Tutorsource Tutor are the same as why be a Tutorsource Tutor…the hard parts are already done. The Tutor has been verified, you already know what their specialty is, what geographical area they will service, and what you can expect the fee will be. And your first meeting is guaranteed, so there is no harm in trying them out. Because all of this is determined ahead of time, you can concentrate on the real substance of the job, what you will be tutoring and how you will accomplish your goal of helping that child.”

Karen Price:

“You as a student may be struggling with Math, English or another subject and want a way out. Well we are here to help both of you. We are here to help the parent, by helping the student. We are here to give the student resources to help them in life. That is what school is about, is giving the student tools to help them succeed in life. Our job is to teach the student how to use these tools that are given to them. "

And finally, my personal favorite:

Rachele DeMeo:

“The final factor someone should look at is where to hire a tutor from. There are many places that offer tutoring at various prices. An individual serious with tutoring should research the following: how long the company has been around, how reliable the company is, how professional the company appears to be, what type of experience/education/training the tutors have and whether the prices are reasonable. TutorSource meets those requirements which in turn pleases students and fulfill their needs. So why not hire a TutorSource tutor now?”

Now that you know a little more about how our tutors view TutorSource, let me ask the same question Rachele asked: Why not hire a TutorSource tutor now?

Choosing to hire “a” tutor may be a fairly pragmatic decision. Your child needs help—you get help. Choosing “the right” tutor is more complicated because it involves the blending of a business decision with a matter of the heart.

Learning is an adventure

No good parent is looking for a knuckle cracking, drill sergeant tutor who will snuff any vestige of the love for learning right out of their child. Yet, somewhere beneath the frustration of poor report cards, as a parent you realize that well-ordered learning instruction is exactly what your child needs. You’ve heard the old rhetoric that “Learning Can Be Fun” and you are now questioning what planet the person who coined that phrase lived on! For a struggling child, formal learning can be misery.

As an educator, I have found that while learning can be fun, sometimes it isn’t. Mostly it is a lot of work. A better paradigm in tutoring is to think of work as an adventure. Adventures have challenges; satisfaction comes in looking back at the end. Having a realistic approach to what tutoring is, and what it is not, is the first and ultimately most vital step in choosing a great tutor.

Find the right fit

The second step ought to be looking for a tutor with a compatible personality. You know your own child better than any professional educator. You know his ability, his character, and his dreams. Unlike a school where your child is assigned to a teacher, in a tutoring situation you get to control which teacher is assigned to your child. Make the most of this parental power!

The wonderful thing about TutorSource is that every tutor you find here has a profile where they make a personal statement and tell you their tutoring approach. I spent considerable time researching different tutoring companies before I signed up here and I chose this one because it is one of the best sites in the market for helping parents make informed choices. Read the tutor profiles carefully. Look for answers that step beyond the standard clichés to find a statement that clicks in your heart. You know your child deserves more than simple computer-matching by zip code.

Qualifications are important, but not everything

A third consideration for choosing the right tutor is the credentialing. It is important, but not all-important. The reason I say this should be fairly obvious; if a college degree and state certification were all it took to make your child a star student, you would not be looking for a tutor now. Every child could put in their thirteen years at school and graduate as a genius.

The significance of any credential is that it marks a baseline for proficiency. Beyond that, it says very little about whether a tutor will be a good match for your child. Tutoring is very different from classroom education. It’s personalized with immediate feedback, customized explanations, and individualized pacing. Choose a tutor who is competent in the subject area where your child needs help, and then has the ability to work outside the conventional classroom rubric.

One point that is easy to overlook when choosing a tutor is the learning style. Perhaps you are aware that your child learns best by seeing pictures, or by hearing explanations, or by doing hand-on projects. These are classified as visual, auditory, and kinetic learning styles respectively. Most people learn by all these means, but have one area that is predominant. Teachers have teaching styles too. A highly visual teaching style will have the greatest success matched with a visual learner. If you are aware of how your child learns best, it can be helpful to have a discussion about learning style during the emailing stage of tutor selection.

Consider the tutor’s experience

Tips on choosing the right tutor would not be complete without commenting on the value of experience. Just as every tutoring situation is unique, so is the importance of tutoring experience. Sometimes it is critical and can make all the difference in the world. Sometimes it is totally superfluous. I have seen a 10-year-old be more effective than a tenured professional at teaching her younger sibling how to read. It is not the norm, but it happens. In this case, the younger child admired and trusted her older sister far more than she admired or trusted Dr. Dryasdust, and it was the experience of the sisters’ relationship, not the academics that made the difference.

If you are seeking tutoring, the norm probably hasn’t been working for your child either. The importance of having experience, which often comes with higher tutoring fees, depends largely upon why your child needs tutoring. By hiring an experienced tutor, you will be improving the chances that you get someone who has dealt with your child’s struggles before. Children with processing disorders and certain learning disabilities are those for whom having an experienced tutor is more important. Children who need a tutor to catch up after an illness or who are seeking tutoring to help them excel in advanced placement may do equally well with a less experienced college student who can explain the material effectively. As a parent, you are the best qualified person to make this judgment call. Perhaps the best way to put it is that experience is very important, but rapport can trump experience.

Conclusion

In the final analysis, remember that you are choosing a mentor for your child. He or she may not have the hottest picture in the profile, or the lengthiest resume on the list, or the catchiest quip on the page, but they ought to be a person who loves their job and shares the values that you want your child to emulate.