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Tutors learning to cope with space

By Josh Dillard
jdillar4@mscd.edu

The tutoring center has been busy this semester. But that’s not hard to believe since during the past two years the center has increased its demand by more than 500 percent, bringing in more students than ever to the main tutoring facility in the Tivoli.

“It’s been crazy. They started coming in droves,” said Eric Dunker, student academic coordinator of the tutoring center. “We used to see 200 students a semester, but now we see 1,000-1,200 students.”

Because of this high demand, the Student Academic Success Program upgraded, and they are up for the challenge.

Since 2006, it has gone from a staff of 10 students to 64 student employees with GPAs higher than 3.0.

Now, drop-in tutoring is offered as well as one-on-one tutoring for student convenience. There is also an online tutoring class at Smarthinking.com that gives Metro students 20 free hours of tutoring and is available 24/7.

Perhaps its biggest change was moving to a bigger space, with two rooms and approximately 2,400 square feet because of work-study funding and the help of the administration.

Even with the added space, the center is continually crowded and in need of expansion.

“A non-academic department is not first in line in relation to space, but what we’re trying to be able to do is prove to the college that we are a very valuable program,” Dunker said. “We know that from statistics that students that come here get better GPAs…we’re helping students. Students are retained — we’re helping the college.”

When considering the size of the tutoring center, it is small compared to other campuses.

Dunker said other campuses tutoring centers average around 100,000 square feet. Metro’s center is significantly smaller with a much smaller staff.

Mike Tinker, a Metro junior majoring in biology, has been a tutor for three years and has seen many changes during his time at the center.

“We need space bad,” he said. “We keep getting more students.”

Dunker said he believes the reason for all the success in bringing students to the center is the marketing techniques used in increasing awareness about the tutoring center and its services.

Recently, e-mails have been sent out to Metro students informing them about tutoring. Mentioning the services by going from class to class has also been a technique.

More than half of the students who visit the center need assistance with math and science, but there are tutors for almost all subjects including English and foreign languages.

Dunker said despite space limitations, any student in need of assistance is welcome. He hopes more students will utilize the center and keep the word of mouth, as well their academic careers, alive.

“It’s like seeing a good movie. They just started telling their friends about this place,” he said. “We want to make sure that they have every opportunity possible to get help before they decide that college isn’t for them.”