Thank you for your feedback David. The ITTPC is in fact looking at our
practices, policies and procedures, which is why I posed the question to
the list serv.
I think we can all agree that it is important for tutors to have ample
opportunity to apply the skills they learn in training to 'real life"
tutoring situations. How we as directors and supervisors can attest to that
time is another issue, and one worth exploring, particularly since many of
our programs offer the drop-in/homework help/lab-type of setting that you
described wherein it is not always practical for the tutor to try to log
every single contact especially those that are very brief in duration.
I welcome feedback from other listserv members, and thank those who have
already responded; Jane, Melissa, Carrie & Jon.
Roberta
Roberta Schotka
Director of Programs
Pforzheimer Learning & Teaching Center
Wellesley College
Wellesley, MA
CRLA-ITTPC Coordinator
[log in to unmask]
----------------------------------------
From: "David Hayes" <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Wednesday, May 27, 2015
11:08 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: How do you track tutor
contact hours?
My apologies, I inadvertently deleted part of a sentence in my second
paragraph, which made it sound confusing. It should have read: We were
told that our tutors needed to log contact hours in the walk in centers,
and when we explained that our centers often get very crowded and our
outnumbered tutors struggle to meet the demand, *we were told that we had
no alternative but to find a way. After several times writing back and
forth, I decided that we were* not going to make their jobs any more
difficult by asking them to carry a notepad around the room with them to
log each interaction. As you write, some contacts last for a long spell,
but others a few minutes or less. The only reason for keeping the log was
to submit it for certification, frankly - it wasn't going to improve the
quality of service, and it was going to add an extra responsibility to the
tutors' workload. Thanks David David B Hayes Director, Academic
Enhancement Center University College for Academic Success University Of
Rhode Island On Wed, May 27, 2015 at 11:47 AM, David Hayes
<[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Hi Roberta, > > We ran into this very
problem with our walk in tutoring programs when we > submitted for
re-certification a couple of years ago, and after weeks worth > of work was
spent assembling the package, we ultimately withdrew from the > process
because we didn't want to alter our practice in order to meet this >
requirement. > > We were told that our tutors needed to log contact hours
in the walk in > centers, and when we explained that our centers often get
very crowded and > our outnumbered tutors struggle to meet the demand, we
were not going to > make their jobs any more difficult by asking them to
carry a notepad around > the room with them to log each interaction. As you
write, some last for a > long spell, but others a few minutes or less. The
only reason for keeping > the log was to submit it for certification,
frankly - it wasn't going to > improve the quality of service, and it was
going to add an extra > responsibility to the tutors' workload. > > About 7
or 8 years ago, I did a presentation at the CRLA national > conference
outlining our training processes and telling the story of how > difficult
it was to bring the process into alignment with application > requirements
because we used a more "authentic" approach which attempted to > make the
in-service portion of the training sessions more responsive to > emerging
needs of tutors in practice. We knew that we were covering all of > the
aspects of training in a deep and meaningful way each semester, and > spent
more than enough time on them. But we couldn't honestly account for > how
many hours we spet on each individual topic. We had to estimate, and >
frankly I was very uncomfortable with that. After the session, several >
people assured me that they too did not provide accurate numbers. > >
Needless to say I was disappointed years later at having to argue the >
point about logging time. It was a frustrating argument in which I felt my
> needs were not being heard, and ultimately that I was being asked to do >
something that as director I felt would compromise the quality of my >
programs. This time, rather than be dishonest, I decided it wasn't worth >
it. It was disappointing, because the certification is a nice thing for >
people to include under the tutoring job on a resume. > > I hope that you
are considering a comprehensive review of your > requirements. I know they
aren't intended to compel programs to move away > from pedagogically sound
practices, they aren't intended to be burdensome, > and they aren't
intended to compel administrators to be dishonest. In my > experience,
however, that's what happened. Twice. > > Respectfully, David Hayes > > On
Tuesday, May 26, 2015, Roberta Schotka <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > >> Hi
All, >> >> CRLA's International Tutor Training Program Certification group
is >> looking >> at various tutoring models to see where we may want to
update our >> certification requirements. >> >> One area that interests us
is how programs that conduct predominantly >> "group", "drop in"
or"homework help" type of environments track tutor and >> tutee
interactions. I am particularly curious about those tutoring >>
environments where one or more tutors circulate a room and may in fact >>
help >> multiple people for anywhere from a few minutes to a half hour or
more. >> >> If this sounds like you- can you tell me how your tutors are
logging >> their >> contacts? Does the tutor complete a log sheet or report
for every >> interaction? Do tutors keep a record of tutee's served? Does
the tutee >> sign >> anything to verify the time spent with the tutor? >>
>> Thanks in advance, >> >> Roberta >> >> Roberta Schotka >> Director of
Programs >> Pforzheimer Learning & Teaching Center >> Wellesley College >>
Wellesley, MA >> CRLA-ITTPC Coordinator >> [log in to unmask] >> >> >> >>
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LRNASST-L owner, email [log in to unmask] >> > > > -- > David B Hayes >
Director, Academic Enhancement Center > University College for Academic
Success > University Of Rhode Island > > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To access the
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