Tipcard # 32: The three basics of being a successful self-employed tutor: Business, Academics & Personal life

You are a brilliant tutor and have a well-established list of long-term students who refer their friends to you constantly. You spend the time to prepare for each of your students and go the extra mile to be original, creative, and even more entertaining so your students learn effectively while enjoying their lessons with you. Your collection of testimonials is growing and now you almost do not even need to advertise… students call you only because they heard of you from someone else. You have turned into a tutoring celebrity keeping a busy schedule and at the same time desperately trying to sneak in a moment for a massage, run in the park, or even a quiet day of reading at home with your phone off.

Now that you have established your business, you will have the opportunity to step back and look at it as exactly… a business.You are your company. The sooner you realize this fact, the easier it will be for you to maintain it and further develop it. A very good start would be to write down everything that you have achieved so far and then list all the goals you foresee that you will achieve in the future. This simple exercise will give you direction – what are you aiming at? More clients? Sub-contracting other tutors? Increasing your price? Improving the quality of your service? Now that you have all answers (please remember that this is only a beginning point for you and your goals and perspective may change with circumstances or as time goes by) you can draw the map, which will get you there. Your map is your portfolio – business, academic, and personal.

Business
Your business portfolio is going to provide the financials and business development information. Create a system of filing every piece of paper that will be relevant to your business. Example of documents you will need:

Revenue spreadsheets: expense and profit
Include both current (where you are) and future (where you want to be in a certain period of time). Record all discounts, sample lessons, promotions, etc. Include everything that brings or spends money from your bank account. The easiest way to keep track of all profit and expenses is by creating invoices/receipts for your clients. Number and date them and file them accordingly – by student name, by topic, or by date. Meanwhile, keep all receipts from your purchases and expenses for accurate calculation of your costs. Remember that as a business owner (even if you don’t have a registered company or business name you must keep these records; in Canada you don’t need to register a company if your revenue is under $30 000/year – consult with an accountant!) you must provide all income sources and write off eligible expenses when you file your income tax. Your business revenue is your personal revenue if you are a sole-proprietor or have a home-based business.

Marketing: Ad campaigns and referrals
Record all your advertising sources and keep track of how students hear about you. This will show you which sources are worth expanding and which you need to stay away from. For example, if you have been paying $100/month for a newspaper ad but no students actually found you through it, you will not need that expense and it is a dead-end source. If you spent 2 days and $200 to print and distribute flyers and 80% of your students come to you with this very flyer in hand, then maybe you should relocate the $100 from the newspaper ad into printing out more flyers and even pay someone to distribute them for you.

Keeping track of all referrals is extremely important. Who sent whom to you? Are you going to give some sort of reward for the person who referred 3 new students to you? Record all relationships of your students who refer other people to you. Maybe you have included a “buddy discount” in your ad campaign and now people are taking advantage of it. Make sure you know whom these people are. Give them incentive to keep sending you students and reward them for “working” for you.

Academics
Your academic “map” scripts who you are as a tutor and educator. This is your academic portfolio where you store your teaching materials, research, articles, professional development pieces, ready-to-use materials, demonstration materials, sample lessons plans, etc. This virtual academic bank starts with your educational philosophy and goals, and finishes… never. This is the ongoing work of a professional educator who collects, revisits, reflects, and develops every artifact in it. Your academic portfolio will not only demonstrate your methodology and resources, but it will also help you organize your work as an educator. Remember to include your testimonials in this portfolio. There is nothing better than being able to open a page and show your potential clients what past students have said about you or what gifts they’ve given you. Choose the best format to represent your academic portfolio – paper-based, electronic (webpage, blog, etc.) or combined.

Your academic map will also include your students’ files. Keep track of what you teach. Knowing how your students progress and what you have already taught them is precious. It is very important that you include lesson plans you have already used – did they work? Why or why not? Every student has different interests and personality and you will benefit from keeping a diary of your interactions. Believe me, when you have so many students and so many lessons, you will start to forget or mix up students. This is a normal course of the tutoring process and you are not a robot or computer to memorize every little detail. That is why it is worth recording it instead.

Personal
That’s right! Your personal life also needs organizing. As you are your company, you need to make time for work and you need to make time for rest, vacation, coffee time, breaks, etc. Make sure you always have a calendar handy so you can record appointments, dinners, etc. There is nothing more embarrassing than calling a student to cancel a lesson because you forgot you had a hair appointment at the same time. A calendar is an excellent time-management tool which is a lifesaver when it comes to scheduling.

In the news

Tutors work to boost Native students

http://www.adn.com/news/education/story/754940.html

Dropout rates are higher, test scores are lower than for students overall

By MEGAN HOLLAND
mholland@adn.com

Published: April 9th, 2009 09:13 PM
Last Modified: April 10th, 2009 05:56 PM

Shafts of sunlight stream through the windows and illuminate the four sixth-graders gathered around the table with Kerri Wood.

Wood is working to solve a vexing problem: Get these kids up to grade level.

Wood is the Indian-education tutor at Tyson Elementary in Mountain View. She is part of a multi-pronged effort involving the Anchorage School District, nonprofits and tribal groups to close the test-score gap between Anchorage's 4,200 Native students and the rest of the district's 48,000 kids.

It's not just poorer test results. Native students have also historically had the highest dropout rate in Anchorage.

Wood works for the school district but her salary is funded by federal Indian Education Act money. The district spends about $2 million of federal money a year on tutors like her. And while administrators say modest gains have been made, the gap is still big.

Last year, scores took a dive. Results in math, reading and writing lagged behind all students by some 15 percentage points.

In December, with the district saying more Native kids are moving into the city from rural Alaska, the School Board tapped the district's own general fund for the first time to increase the number of tutors by a third.

"The needs of Alaska Native/American Indian students are profound," the district said.

STRADDLING TWO WORLDS

Among the grim statistics from last school year's data:

• By the end of ninth grade, only 58 percent of Native students had enough credits to be on track to graduate in four years, compared with 77 percent of all students.

• Only 1 percent of Natives took higher-level high school courses compared with 8 percent of all students.

• Two-thirds of Native students didn't get their diplomas after four years of high school.

The problem starts at a young age.

Many education experts, including former Alaska education commissioner Roger Sampson, say that if a student is not reading at grade level by the third grade, the student's chances of ever catching up are slim. It is an indicator of the future dropout rate, he has said.

Last year, 67 percent of Native third-grade students in Anchorage read at grade level compared with 81 percent of all students.

Educators don't know exactly what's wrong.

The problems are varied, they say. Teachers who reward the most animated students, when Native children are taught to be demure. Kids who show up at school without breakfast. Westernized curriculum that teaches young children unfamiliar words like teacup, cow and sailboat.

In a grant application to fund an upcoming program for Native boys, whom the district consider to be the most vulnerable, the district wrote that many Native homes are not highly verbal. Another problem may be how the students are being taught. Native boys, in particular, are not reached by many of the usual instructional methods, the grant application says.

"We are not understanding the home culture," said Doreen Brown, the district's Indian Education supervisor, who has the job of solving the puzzle. "We are so good at the academic culture we don't understand the home culture. We don't understand the home language. We, as educators, don't understand the experiences that these kids are coming to us with, and it's very different than white middle class. It's not bad, it's just very different."

Brown, who is Yup'ik, knows many of these kids are straddling two worlds, just as she did growing up in Anchorage and graduating from Service High in the 1980s. "My people have been educated for thousands of years, tens of thousands of years. We've been educated, we've survived in the harshest environments. And I can look at my own life and I'm technically only the third generation to go to school. That's not a large amount of time," she said.

Brown is in charge of 45 employees, including Wood. She runs summer enrichment programs and after-school tutoring. She works on dropout prevention. She does crisis-intervention. And she secures federal grant money, or any grants she can find, to make it all happen.

"What are we not doing right? I think one of the strongest components is that we're not making (education) culturally responsive," she said.

"A lot of Native students don't want to be the center of attention. They don't want to raise their hands, 'I know the answer! I know the answer!' "

Before she became supervisor, when she worked directly with Native students, she would have kids practice raising their hands, she said.

Brown says there's not enough money to reach every kid. She has to be selective. In the end, tutors are placed at the schools with the highest population of Natives, and within those schools, it's the kids who score the worst who are tutored.

Brown says there are about 9,000 Natives and part-Natives who are eligible for the Indian Education services. She says her staff is reaching about 30 percent of them.

Asked if she thinks the tutoring is making a difference, she paused. "It can be effective. I think that our students and our parents need a point of contact. ... I would say most of my staff are very overwhelmed."

Research shows that if tutoring is to make a difference, students need to see their tutors at least three times a week for 30 minutes, she said. That's the formula. But sometimes, Brown says, that isn't happening.

Wood, at Tyson, said Native fifth-graders at the school aren't being tutored because of scheduling conflicts, and some of her sixth-graders get tutoring only twice a week.

SAFE LEARNING

Back in her classroom, Wood, who is Athabascan, asks sixth-grader La-Vera Wise about the noun she is looking at on the textbook page. "Is it a person, place or thing?"

She moves from one child to the next, reviewing each of the children's work as they locate proper nouns and common nouns. The four sixth-graders are too big for the undersized plastic chairs and low-hung table.

Wood works with 45 of Tyson's 140 Native kids.

She points to a sentence. "Can you find one here? Can you show me?" she asks, goading La-Vera.

Later, Wood explains she circles the children and watches over their shoulders to catch mistakes as they happen. She also prefers to correct them one-on-one, not in a group setting. "You need to create a safe learning environment," she says.

Sometimes Wood re-teaches what the children's teachers have already covered. Other times, she pre-teaches so kids are ready with answers and concepts.

"Sometimes it's setting them up for success," Brown explained of the tactical ego boosts. "It feels good."

Every month, the children are tested and their scores combed over.

"Looking at the data and making adjustments to teaching style is something that we take very seriously here," Wood said. "If things aren't working, we have to change it. And if it's still not working, we need to change it again."

She said the goal is to get the kids up to grade level so they don't have to see her anymore.

La-Vera, who is 13, lives in Anchorage with her stepsister while the rest of her family lives in the Western Alaska village of Upper Kalskag. Her father, Andrew Wise, said he thinks the tutoring is making a difference -- it's one of the reasons he lets her live in the city.

It is important that his daughter graduate from high school, he said. "I put myself through school," he said of getting his diploma. "It made a difference."

---

Counting Native students

Test score results for ethnic groups are based on how students self-identify. In October, the number of Anchorage School District students who said they are Native on district forms was 4,200.

However, the number of students eligible for Native education services is 9,000. This larger number includes the students who are part Native. On school district forms, some of the additional students might self-identify as multiethnic.

In the news: Canadians make learning disabilities breakthrough

Canadians make learning disabilities breakthrough

Updated Tue. Feb. 24 2009 2:54 PM ET

CTV.ca News Staff

The dream of treating learning disabilities with a drug is a little closer to reality now that Canadian scientists have identified a brain protein crucial to learning.

A Toronto research team discovered that this single protein, known as Neto1, helps brain cells talk to one another. If the protein is missing or not working properly, it can result in learning disabilities.

What's more, further research has found that a drug being tested in Alzheimer's patients may also help those missing this key brain cell protein.

The research is still preliminary and was cconducted on mice, so it's not clear whether the findings will translate into humans. But if they do, the discovery opens the door to the possibility that drug treatment could help those with learning disabilities.

Lead investigator, Dr. Roderick McInnes, a geneticist at the Hospital for Sick Children, made the breakthrough while hunting for genes involved in eye development in 2000. That's when he and his postdoctoral fellow David Ng came across Neto1.

"It's an unexpected surprise," McInnes told CTV Newsnet on Tuesday.

"One would hope ... similar effects might be possible some day in patients with learning disabilities," McInnes added.

Research from his lab proved the protein to be very active in sending messages between cells in the hippocampus, the part of the brain region heavily involved in memory and learning.

To find out how important the protein was to learning, the researchers decided to breed mice that were missing the gene that makes the Neto1 protein and then evaluate the cognitive abilities of those mice.

They found that the altered mice had no obvious physical or behavioural problems but did have trouble learning new skills compared to normal mice.

The mice missing Neto1 failed a simple test in which they were made to swim through a water maze and find a hidden safety platform that would get them out of the water. Normal mice swimming through the maze were able to find the platform faster with each try, but the mice missing Neto1 got lost every time and did not seem to remember how to find the platform.

Dr. Michael Salter, head of the neuroscience and mental health program at Sick Kids, found the altered mice could only generate electrical signals between brain cells at half the strength of normal mice.

The researchers conclude that mice missing Neto1 have fewer receptors on their brain cells that are crucial for forming memories and learning, known as NMDA receptors.

Dr. John Roder at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital then wondered if a medication now being tested in Alzheimer's patients might fix the problem.

The drugs, known as ampakines, don't increase the number of NMDA receptors, but they do seem to help them function better. In the Neto1-deficient mice, their brain cell connections were strengthened so well that they could then perform cognitive tests as well as normal mice.

Salter said the effects of the drugs were almost immediate.

But the use of ampakines for learning disabilities is still a long way off. The drugs have passed Phase 1 safety trials and are now being tested in larger Phase 2 trials to test their effectiveness for Alzheimer's patients. But it's not known when, or if, they can be tested in people with learning disabilities.

The research is published in the current issue of PLoS Biology.

Resources

I found this wonderful tool for learning vocabulary. You may have already seen it but I thought it's definitely worth sharing here on the blog. Check out the Lexipedia flash vocabulary tool. Type a word in the search line and press Enter. It will show all possible connections to that word including synonyms, antonyms, verbs, adverbs, etc. You can click on any one of them and drag with your mouse to re-arrange them in the way suitable for your needs. Try it out... it's a lot of fun.

Tipcard # 31: netWorking with a capital "W"

“It takes hard work and persistence”
Have you heard this before? I bet you have. Especially regarding sports, studying, hobbies, etc. I would like to also add networking to the list. A network is what every self-employed tutor should be working to get and most importantly, keep and expand. Get into the communities that will need your services, get in touch with organizations helping newly arriving immigrants and let them know that you can supplement their English language acquisition. The best places to meet professionals from the ESL field are local events, conferences, and even sports events that are being organized around town. Read newsletters and bulletins from your local library or community center. Remember that no favour comes for free – you need to offer something in return to people referring students to you even if it means taking them out to coffee or even informal lunch.

Once you have established yourself as THE tutor, you need to work to keep and expand your network. It takes a lot of PR work to be successful. Get in the habit of collecting people’s contact information and create a database of potential and present clients of yours. I am sure they will be delighted to receive a nice funny Christmas card or even wishing them a great first day of spring with a creative witty card. Some tutors use email to remind their client of their services. I would recommend this method only if you have something new to report to your clients. Lets face it – people hate bulk emails and unless these emails are informative enough for them, they hit “delete” to get rid of them as soon as possible.

It might be old-fashioned but try to meet people face-to-face. Remember that you build trust by materializing what you offer in contrast to describing it in an email. When people see you they get their first impression of you and how professional you are. I know that you are probably thinking: why would I meet all these people if they are not actual potential students of mine? Remember, you never know where an opportunity will come from. Maybe you get invited to speak in front of somebody’s class. Maybe someone will remember you when they hear that a student needs help. You are always going to be better off having more contacts and letting people hear your name over and over again, than stay at home and wait for a student to call you. It is very important to be out and about. You can even organize specific language workshops for students. How? The best way to do it (and cheapest too) is to contact your local library and see if they have study rooms available. Usually these rooms are free. And even if they are not, putting a low price for your workshop will cover the cost: believe me it’s not that expensive to rent a room in a library. Make simple fliers and post them around the library. Let people know when and where the workshop is going to be. Make sure you have your contact information handy for potential students to pick up.

Once you have established your networking methods and have spread the word about your services, it is essential that you start keeping track of your contacts. When you receive a call from a student, ask them how they heard about you: was it a reference from a friend, or they picked up your number from your workshop, were they referred to you by an agency and which one? Keeping track of the sources of references will give you an idea about the strongest points of your network. This information is absolutely precious. Knowing where business is coming from lets you focus your effort in that direction. Now that you know who is referring students to you, you can afford to ignore sources that are not so efficient and concentrate on the ones that bring you business.

Following the dynamics of your sources of business is essential also because you need to be aware of any changes happening in your network. If you find that an agency that used to be very passive in referring students to you has changed managers and their new policy is to emphasize on academic achievement of students, you need to get in contact with them immediately. Your tutoring services could be a very good supplement to their students’ education. Renewing contacts and shifting focus within your target market is crucial to your business. Knowing that a community center, which used to send a large number of students to you, has ended their support for international students can save you a lot of dead-end attempts to continue promoting your services there. Obviously they cannot refer any more students simply because these students will be seeking academic support somewhere else. In other words, your network changes constantly and it is up to you to keep track and stay up to date. Yes, it sounds like a lot of work and it is. That is the meaning of being professional. This type of work is making you different from everybody else.

Talks: Sir Ken Robinson: Do schools kill creativity?

Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that nurtures (rather than undermines) creativity.
Watch the talk here.

Tipcard # 30: How much are you worth?!

You hear the alarm clock early in the morning ringing its batteries off and you are thinking: “I am not getting paid enough to be getting up so early for work!” It’s probably true. Think about all the hours of preparation you put into every class you teach – the research, the copying, the lesson plan, the thought and time you put into being a great teacher. I don’t have to convince you that this is a HUGE amount of work. Well is this HUGE amount of work worth a HUGE amount of money?

I mean we all know that becoming a teacher is a calling not a chore (although some pseudo-teachers may think it is). You have to be passionate about what you do and how you do it. Are you THE best teacher or are you slacking off whenever you can? The truth is, most teachers (luckily) accept their profession as a life-style. Talk about identifying yourself with your profession (which in many cases sounds and looks pathetic). Think about it: don’t you thin it is really sad to hear that an accountant identifies herself with her profession and with what she does. I mean there is nothing wrong with being surrounded with numbers and papers but if they were to be taken away, who will you be? That is how you realize whether you are really identifying yourself with what you do. Don’t get me wrong… I am not saying accountants are lousy people. Rather, I am trying to exaggerate for the purpose of comparison in this essay. So back to teachers… if students and schools were to be taken away… who will you be? I dare to think that the teaching profession is one of the few where outside it, the person is still the person they were while in it… except they would be a person with… more time on their hands. You will still be the sociable, cheerful, funny, smart, entertaining person who makes everyone laugh and even occasionally learn. You will still be the person who knows how to know people. In other words, you have the unique skill to read into people’s personalities and know exactly how to talk them and how to be their friends. Forgive me for putting it so bluntly, but you will still be useful to society. We do need people who would not answer: “I am a teacher” when asked “Who are you?”

Even if you are making less money than you think you should be, think about how lucky you are to just be practicing a profession which lets you be you. And if you want to raise your fees for your private tutoring lessons, do so. Make sure you let your students know why. Be honest with them. Instead of coming up with reasons such as the increasing cost of paper and transportation, books and inflation (which I am sure are viable reasons), let them know that you are worth more because you have improved, because you are the best they can get, because you make them learn. Ask them to argue with you if they think it is necessary. Ask them to prove you wrong. See if they can show you what a lousy teacher you are. I bet they won’t be able to. And even if they do come up with all sorts of reasons and eventually decide to seek someone else’s services, remember: you are still you. The fact that a student decides to leave you because of a fee increase does not make you less of a person (not to mention less of a teacher). You will be able to find new students and you know it. No matter how many students you lose, you will never lose your personality and passion for teaching. Now THAT is worth a lot! So go ahead… go brush your teeth and head to work – it’s time to teach a lesson.

Tipcard # 29: The logistics of tutoring

Where do you tutor?
Logistics is an important element of the tutoring experience. Some tutors are located in colleges and universities where there are tutoring centers; or the more profitable tutors rent their own offices in libraries, community centers, churches, etc. Others prefer to be "on-the-go" tutors and offer flexibility to their clients by going closer to their location or even their own home, office, etc. We can argue about which option is better but I would suggest that all are efficient if your clients like them. Still, when choosing a location tutors should have a few things in mind.

You will have to generally look for the following characteristics (not limited to only these though) of a learning space:

1. Size
   You don't want to feel cramped into a tiny room where there is hardly space for a table and two chairs. At the same time, you don't want to be hearing the echo of your words in a warehouse-like room where you feel too distant from your student. Choose a room where you will be able to stand up and walk around your desk/table; where you have space for your books, materials, paper; space for writing comfortably without having to constantly adjust your notebook because of lack of space.
2. Light
   Are there enough windows? If it is dark - are there enough lamps to provide light? What kind of artificial light is there? Remember that the white fluorescent light can be hard on the eyes and create a sleepy irritating mood both for you and your student. Try to choose a place with soft, neutral lighting which will provide comfort. Make sure the space is not too dark - you are not aiming for a lounge-like setting.
   
3. Temperature
   There is nothing more uncomfortable than a really cold or really hot room to study in. You want your student to concentrate on the lesson and be comfortable rather than be embarrassed that they sweat too much or their shivering is affecting their pronunciation. For example if you decide to have your lesson outside on a park bench, make sure it is a warm day outside and there is plenty of shade to sit under. You do not want your student (or you) to be worried about sunburn in the middle of the lesson. Consider the weather: is it windy, is it hot, is it cloudy, is it going to rain?
   
4. Noise
   How many times have you read a paragraph 8 times without understanding it because of a nasty noise outside your door or window? Your student will be distracted too. That is why I think the worst place to have a lesson is a coffee shop. You have people constantly coming in and going out, chatting, laughing, shouting. The coffee machine is loud and the steamer prevents you from hearing your own words. Make sure you choose a quiet place to study with your student. It is essential that they repeat a word in order to remember it, not in order to outshout the jackhammer under the window.
   
5. Aesthetics
   Last but not least: aesthetics. Ask yourself the question: Is my learning space pleasant to be in? Think about color, shape, texture, etc. The most unwelcoming space is the one which simulates a hospital - all white. Choose a place with more color. You want to provide a pleasant, natural colors and textures space. For example, plastic chairs and tables are cheap and easy to clean, but they also create static and are not breathable. You also do not want all metal furniture as it looks cold. The window coverings should also be appropriate for a study room - do they let enough light in; are they in harmony with the rest of the place? Photos and paintings on the walls also create comfort and a cosy feeling. You may want to avoid air-fresheners as many people are allergic to them.

Lets examine a few options for choosing a leaning place and see what we need to look for. I'll start with the most costly:

Renting a place
Often this option is preferred both by clients and tutors as it provides a neutral zone for both to meet and adjust to it together. The downside of it is, the tutor will have to pay for it. You can either increase your fees (be very careful though) and include the rent in the lesson fee or you can rely on volume of students you get and assume the cost as a nature expense on your side. Remember that as a self-employed individual, you will be able to deduct this cost from your income tax (consult your accountant).

Student's accommodation
Going to the student's home is convenient for the student and a good reason for you to ask for a higher fee. Make sure that you ask the student if the room where you will be studying is comfortable enough (use the characteristics above to assess the space). You must be careful though especially with new students you do not know because their location may not be in the safest part of town or they may not have the best intentions towards you. Get to know them better before you agree to visit their place.

Tutor's accommodation
If you are inviting students to your place, I would suggest taking into consideration the same concerns as going to a student's place. Safety. Do you really want to let people so close as to letting them into your home? I would leave that option to a later stage when you get to know your students better. Still, sometimes you think you know someone... Just be careful.

Library
Lots of libraries have special study rooms which can be rented free of charge for a limited time. Visit your local library and ask for such spaces. Also make sure they are at a reasonable distance for you and your student. Explain to the student exactly what to expect and what the rules of the library are before you go.

Coffee shops & public places
As I mentioned, coffee shops are not your best choice simply because of all distractions in them. Besides usually they ask you to buy something in order to stay there longer. Any public space will have lots of noise and people. Consider these places as last-resort choice.

No matter what learning space you choose, make sure it is comfortable for both you and your students. Bear in mind that it is the place where learning should be fostered.