I guess this is the best forum for this. I am a math tutor. I have tutored honors classes in fancy neighborhoods where I have been told that almost all of the students have private tutors. One is honors Algebra II, where the teacher was very good, but graded hard, didn’t give students enough time to finish the tests, gave really hard tests and so on. Another was BC Calculus where the teacher didn’t teach, but gave fairly hard tests. No one in the class was getting an A, although many were first semester seniors, applying to Ivies and such, with all A or almost all As so far. The parents would get tutors so that the students’ college prospects would not be damaged.
Is there a question or just sharing? I’m confused what to do with this other than tut-tut at the state of things.
I heard each of those types of complaints, or characterizations, about teachers at my kids’ 7-12 school, and learned years after enrolling my kids and having them thrive academically that some parents had even demanded one of the teachers be fired. That teacher was a favorite of each of my kids - who had no tutor, nor a reason for one.
There are those who do a poor job of teaching, yes, but I have to wonder if your idea of where the onus for the tough time the students are having comes exclusively from the students? (You can’t sit in the classroom, as you sound like an adult and not a peer of those who need tutoring, so…)
There may be many factors in play here.
I was just throwing this up for discussion. I can’t go into any more detail. However, I saw enough to sure that my description of the situations is accurate.
I know of a private school in our area where every student has a private tutor. It’s a real rat race there. Tutoring isn’t common at my D’s public school. There is plenty of afterschool and beforeschool help from the teachers, who are mostly very good (or they will he fired quickly).
Nobody at my son’s school had tutors unless they were really struggling. The visited with teachers and used the regular scheduled help resources in the library.
There are a few teachers at our kids’ public school who are as OP described. Parents also arrange for students to participate in enrichment programs outside of school, and some Asian parents send their children to cram schools.
Parents of special needs students in our district are also spending through the nose for private services to supplement what the public school offers, often at expense of retirement savings for parents and college funds for siblings, and this is often after a parent has abandoned a career for lack of childcare availability at any price.
When my children have done well in school, other parents (including a few who are teachers) have asked for the names of any tutors or therapists I have used.
This becomes an issue if parents ask that a public school take action if a curriculum is not working for students or an individual teacher in a unionized district is not doing a good job, or when districts seek to blame parents for a child’s lack of progress. It also becomes an issue when parents want to know if their child is not learning because of a disability, or because instruction is poor or insufficient.
I would add that in college, students who did not need tutoring help in high school. can be at a disadvantage.
No surprises here. I am not sure what you want to discuss. Yes, people get tutors for their kids for all kinds of reasons. Why is that a problem? You are a tutor. So am I. Our livelihoods depend on parents spending their money this way. I have spent my own money this way. Some parents spend their money on cars for their kids, cell phones, or the latest fashions. Others spend their money on tutors. This is not a conversation because there doesn’t seem to be a point to the post.
If a child is struggling in a class why wouldn’t a parent get a tutor (other than finances)? I found that when my kids took certain classes that required a way of thinking they had not previously encountered they needed some help. I was able to help in Algebra so I didn’t hire tutors but all 3 of my kids needed some help outside of the classroom. Calculus is another class that my oldest required extra help. Since it has been so many years since I used Calculus I hired a tutor for him. It helped.
Why is any of this a bad thing? Parents should support their kids educational needs.
To summarize: tutoring occurs, sometimes within the school, sometimes privately. It is often helpful.
I hope that cleared things up.
Is it safe to assume that they are good students who pack their lives full with other activities in addition to academics? If so, my kids’ not needing tutoring means our lives are simpler, goals are set lower, and not academically more capable. We may need to set our goals higher and seek professional help if resources permit. I heard that even LeBron James has personal trainers.
@frazzled2thecore what kind of disadvantages do you mean, coursework related or other things?
@elholi - What I meant was that students having trouble with a college course might not realize that they could be helped by finding a tutor (even a peer tutor) , or not know how to go about finding and utilizing a suitable tutor, if they have not experienced this in high school.
In my honest opinion, tutors are certainly required in specific situations and can be invaluable assets to students who are truly struggling. However, there has been a growing theme of parents getting their kids children simply because other parents are doing the same. Students attend class for a specific reason and that is to learn. If the teacher is not giving them what is required to do well on a test (that includes information given in class AND homework) then that is a different problem of utter incompetence.
If every student in a class needs a tutor, then the teacher just isn’t very good. My daughter’s Algebra II teacher was as you describe. Many of her peers needed tutors to get a B or C in the class. While Alg II is a difficult class, I don’t think the teacher was as good as she might have been at getting the material across. And I think she viewed her job as either weeding out the good math students from the bad ones, or providing some kind of hideous endurance challenge, rather than, you know, trying to teach everyone math.
Years later, my daughter still remembers that class as her absolute worst.
I get @frazzled2thecore’s point. My son has been in several classes where many people had tutors. He tutored friends himself, mostly for free in AP Physics and AP Calc. He has had the perception that tutoring is not for people like him, and I worry that when he goes to college he won’t take advantage of services provided by the college to help students, such as office hours, writing centers, etc. He did attend a summer camp where participating in study groups was necessary because of the volume/challenge level, so I think he’s gotten the idea from that experience that help is useful sometimes.
My daughter is struggling in AP Physics because of a similar situation - the teacher isn’t teaching, it’s unfortunate. Even more unfortunate is that we would love to hire a tutor but cannot find one in our area for this subject.
I’m also not sure the point of your post.
@Fishnlines29 Have you tried videos? flippingphysics.com and bozemanscience.com are good resources for Physics help.
Our school offers free tutoring staffed by kids who need hours for NHS but many students pay for tutoring too. DS18 has been paid to tutor in comp sci and algebra 2 and AP Physics 1 and 2 and is making $30 an hour! I still can’t believe kids are paying him that much. Evidently one kids’ parents were so pleased with his work with their son they told the GC about it and now the GC is referring other kids to him! He tutor’s ds20 in Chinese but doesn’t charge him;-)
@AroundHere Thanks for the tip; I will suggest these to my daughter.
It turns out that when there are selective institutions that are perceived as offering a higher-chance path of prosperity and stability, people are going to go to great lengths to get into those institutions, and when there’s competition, those with resources are going to invest in winning that competition. Not great, but what are you going to do about it (aside from massive, radical, systemic reform)?