The Tutoring Center?

College is hard. I think we can all agree on that! It’s only my second semester here and I can already feel the stress of being a broke college student. With hard classes, come hard professors, with their hard assignments and final exams. I think I’m not alone when I say that I for sure, do NOT want to be failing those. Studying in the library is such a common thing in college, a lot more common that I would ever have thought to assume. In our library is Learning Assistance Center where, believe it or not, there are tutors who’s job is to assist you in your learning.

Whilst most students don’t like to admit that they need help, a lot of us really do! From help with simple algebra questions to quantitative business analysis, the tutoring center has it all. Personally, as an athlete, I had to meet a minimum number of hours that I would study in the tutoring center for, to keep up my GPA, which is how to started to love it. I found myself going back even on days that I was not assigned to go, and soon became more confident to ask questions and ask for help with any of my subjects. I met such a range of different people there – both student tutors and staff that made such everything ran smoothly. I made bonds and friends with some of the tutors there, which really made my experiences studying a lot more enjoyable and less mundane.

Most people would not think of the tutoring center as a social setting, however from my own experience I would totally disagree. The students that go there range entirely from different ages, to race, to height and gender. Some are loud, whereas some are super quiet. As mentioned previously, many athletes have mandatory hours that they are required to do in the tutoring center, which is the real reason why I chose the tutoring center as a space to observe. When in the tutoring center, there is a noticeable different between those that have to be there (i.e. athletes) and those that choose to be there.

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Crash Course

As my week goes on, I continue thinking about the observations I saw during the week. The tutoring center turned out to be much more of an interesting social space than I would have ever imagined. From football players, to swimmers, to Joana studying for her Bio-Chem exam, there was such a range of different people there. As briefly touched on in previous blog posts, I found it so strange how much the athletes in the center were on their cell phones. Who would have thought that the individuals who are used to being instructed and obedient would be so easily distracted by a computer the size of their palm. As an athlete myself, I am aware of the struggles of time management and how difficult it is to fit everything into a 24 hour time period; so it would be easy for me to think that most athletes would fully utilise their mandatory hours in the tutoring center. However, it really does make me think; why the hell are these athletes so fascinated by their phones? It is be...

Do you use your phones on the field?

Tuesday 3 rd April 2018. This time I went to the center in the evening. On my previous visits, I noticed that more people show up towards the end of the day, as they are completely done with their classes. This gave me a lot more to observe. Continuing on with my previous theme about athletes and their cell phone usage, I saw another group of athletes, field hockey players this time all enter the center at the same time. They proceeded to do the same with as the football players yesterday. They signed in at a front desk, walked towards the back of the center, then sat down and immediately went on their phones. They continued on their phones and chatting with eachother, until one of them had a question that she needed a tutor for. A tutor then moved his belongings and sat with the hockey players in order to help the girl with her work. As soon as one of them started doing work, the others soon followed and within 10 minutes, all five of them were scribbling down in their note...

Does anyone like Mondays?

Monday 2 rd April 2018. Mondays – you either love them or you hate them. Me, I can’t say I’m the biggest fan of Mondays. The start of the week; thinking about how quickly the weekend passed; kicking myself over the amount of work that needs to be done. And from my observations today, I can say that a lot of the students at Pace feel the same way. I sat in the tutoring center at 1PM, for 1 hour. Almost everyone that walked into the center had the same expression on their face. A combination of “why am I here”, “no-one talk to me”, and “why am I not still in bed”. It must have been a long morning for some, barely lifting their feet up from the ground as they stumbled into the center to find a desk. A lot of students do not have class on Monday mornings, so consequently a lot of sports teams have practice at this time. This was especially noticeable when a group of four football players all walked in together, cheeks somewhat blushed, and their foreheads ever so slightly glisten...

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