New Tutoring for the AAC

By NangZarm Hseng

Waldorf’s Academic Achievement Center (AAC) started a three hour long drop-in tutoring session for students in need of assistance on Monday, Nov. 4, 2019.

With the new program that is held from 7 to 9 p.m. on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, students can just drop in at AAC to get assistance from student tutors.

There were 18 students who sought for assistance during the drop-in hours of the first day. Lauren Dohlman, General Psychology tutor and Nicolas Farkas, a tutor for English Composition II, Introduction to Criminology and Introduction to Criminal Justice, each provided assistances to eight students on that night.

According to Renae Littrell, Director of Retention and Pillars Program, there was a good turn-out on the first day of drop-in tutoring session.

However, the number of attendees dropped significantly on the following days. There were only four students at the drop-in sessions on Monday, Nov. 12.

The drop-in tutoring session is a try-out program to provide more opportunities and ease for students to get help besides the existing tutoring program.

“We wanted to find a place that all the resources could be at one time, where students don’t have obligation to reach out or try to match schedule,” said Littrell.

With the suggestion from the coach, James Cook, a junior in Psychology and a baseball player, dropped in at the AAC for an assistance on Elementary Statistics from Sonia Germán Molina.

“This tutor is being helpful,” Cook said. “She just answered a lot of questions that my teacher can’t.”

A tutor and a sophomore in Exercise and Health Promotion major and Biology minor, Molina, thinks that she could help students with their homework by tutoring them.

“Get them to know what is going on in the class, the formula, so they can have the basic idea and go forward with that,” she said.

To improve her tutoring, Molina also hopes to work together with a professor.

“So I can know what quizzes and homework are and I can work on them and help the students better.”

As explained by Littrell, while the drop-in tutoring session is a pilot program to make the service consistent, students can still get help from the existing tutoring program. There are 23 tutors who cover 41 courses from Critical Thinking, basic computer applications, Elementary Statistics, to Marketing and Exploring Literature.

In this fall semester, 35 students have been getting assistance from tutors for 15 courses. At the top of the list is Publication Design course tutored by Diana Humble, a senior in Creative Writing, Communications, and English major, followed by General Chemistry course tutored by Dildora Farhatova, a sophomore in Biology major.