<p>I have commented many times on my frustration with the school district and how it has forced myself as well as many other families to pay for outside tutoring. I am not talking about SAT classes to boost scores, but private tutoring when students have either been pushed ahead before they have mastered grade level work, or when they have learning disabilties that prevent them from doing so or both.
This phenomena isn’t limited to our district- it is nationwide-even international as are apparently the tutors who are hired to help students silicon valley</p>
<p>Schools that arent meeting performance standards are obliged to provide tutoring to students who meet criteria- but their own teachers aren’t allowed to provide the tutoring, and the tutors who are, may not even qualify to be hired as a teacher in that district.</p>
<p>Families don’t have the money to pay for tutoring, and they are often not equipped to give as much support as is needed to their student. Something is wrong somewhere but it seems we are more focused on placing blame than on finding a solution. It should be about the children- they are our future- and we are failing them.
<a href=“http://susanohanian.org/[/url]”>http://susanohanian.org/</a></p>
<p>Volunteer tutoring within the schools would go a long way towards ameliorating the problem. Most kids, when someone competent sits down with them, can master the material.</p>
<p>My d was asked by faculty to get a peers tutoring program started at her school. It’s been a big hit and very effective. She took that idea and expanded it outside of school creating an organization that matched high school honor student tutors with younger elementary and m.s. students in need of tutoring services. The services were free and the tutors received community service hours for their work. It has also been effective…and is proof that kids do learn very well in a peer setting and that spending big bucks are not necessarily the way to go.</p>
<p>NHS students tutor for free in our school. Many teachers do tutor their own students after or before school, as well. I think that having someone else explain something that the student didn’t get usually helps. Students get a different perspective, if they didn’t understand it from the teacher the first, second, or third time. What I am seeing, since I teach advanced foreign language classes, is kids taking the classes who have no business being there, with poor foundations, never having memorized vocabulary for long-term retention, but their parents insist they take the classes so they can get a higher ranked diploma, or think they will do well on the AP tests (how, when they come to me with mediocre grades from the first 2 years, is beyond me!) Within a week, they are lost, and they struggle. Tutoring these kids would be reteaching the first 2 years while they were taking advanced classes. If that isn’t going to make a kid hate the subject, nothing will! Or in another case, divorced parents marry and each has a son, one with abilities to take Honors/AP, the other with other interests and talents. The parent of the other son forces the kid into these classes, not wanting to admit this kid is swimming against the tide. Then, after he struggles for a whole semester, and barely passes, they don’t let him drop second semester, and now he’s failing. And now they want me to tutor him. Realize that so far, we have reviewed things he had learned in prior years, and added to it. To this poor child, it was all new to him, because he hadn’t learned it well enough in the first place. Step had no problem at all. Most of my students had A’s or B’s/ Not everyone was meant to be a language scholar, just as I wasn’t meant to be a neurosurgeon. I am NOT saying we shouldn’t challenge our kids. I do. But also, we shouldn’t as parents set them up for failure. Just as every child is not a fit for HYP, not every child is meant to take AP and Honors classes.</p>
<p>evitajr1- some students don’t have all the skills for different reasons. Some have LD that make it hard to retain vocabulary. Others could handle the work but the foundation was not built upon in previous years due to poor teaching.
Our high school has quite a few Spanish teachers. It is well known that only 1 of them is any good. The others don’t even rank up there with decent. If you are lucky enough to get the one teacher you are in heaven. I know some kids who have each year gotten stuck with one of the others. My oldest was lucky to have the great teacher for all 3 yrs she attended her high school. My 2nd child had 2 different teachers before he got lucky. He has learned more this year then in the previous 3. He was ready to quit foreign language completely till we got a tutor and then made the decision if he was lucky and got the good teacher he would continue if not he would drop the class. It has been a great year for him.
On another note- A great volunteer job is to spend a few hours a week working in the classroom of a poorly performing school. Several people I know have begun doing this since their children are grown. In many schools the parents don’t have the time or the English skills to be parent helpers. In my youngest D’s elementary school they have so many parents who want to help that they don’t need them all. But only a few miles away my friend teachers at school where they have no parent volunteers.</p>
<p>My kid’s school (private, religious) has free tutoring available via the hs NHS students who do it as part of their community service. It seems to be a “win-win” for both groups.
Ld mom - congrats to your daughter on starting such a successful program!</p>
<p>My S, who is a high school senior, has a tutoring business. He started out with one family and now tutors between 3-6 kids a week – mostly in Math. Business especially picks up around the time of semester final exams. Kids are from his public school and some privates. Increased
business has come from word of mouth both parents and kids. Our school district introduced new math programs in the middle school a few years ago and there have been many complaints – and much tutoring as a result.</p>
<p>there is also a relevant math thread- but I have noticed that across the country the need for tutoring has increased along with the combination of testing and 'connected" math programs.
Then districts disregard that maybe one district is sending most of their kids to tutors every day- look at the test scores and exclaim " we need to get some of that integrated math!"</p>
<p>I started a tutoring service this year (I’m a high school senior) and use intelligent friends as tutors. Those who can pay do pay, and those who can’t recieve scholarships from a local business sponsor. Not as good or expansive as it can be, but it’s improving.</p>
<p>this is a topic close to my heart. in high school, my son needed tutoring. the school was absolutely no help, despite him having an IEP. They didn’t even have a peer tutoring system. I went to sylvan, and they handed me a financial aid form to complete, that was my first clue as to the expense. it was completely not affordable. When my children had to suddenly change to a new school, they offered all kinds of tutoring ranging from starting with a peer to teacher assistance. The differences between what schools offer is ridiculous and unfair. Your quality of education is solely based on where you live, and that shouldn’t be.</p>
<p>I hated sylvan- we went for the testing - but they placed more emphasis on payment plans over educational plans- so we chose not to go that route.
There are lots of free tutors around, but I don’t remember so much tutoring being needed or available when I was in school, and I find that curious.</p>
<p>I’m sorry to hear that about Sylvan. I just took my son there yesterday for the assessment. The waiting room was full of glowing parent testimonials; some from people we know (their office happens to be close to where we live.) That was very encouraging to me, and gave me a lot of hope. </p>
<p>The parent meeting is on Monday. I’m anxious to see how it goes.</p>
<p>since it is a franchise, I am sure much depends on the owner/operator, while where she went for Kumon tutoring, the owner was a teacher, and had more experience in education, at our local Sylvan, the owner wasn’t in education before he opened the franchise, and so didn’t know details of how you would teach someone differently who had learning disabilties as opposed to someone who just needed more time</p>