Word: tutors
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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There has been some debate as to whether the senior tutor should be more of an administrator, or more of a counselor and an advisor. The dean of the College prefers the role of the bureaucrat while others straddle the fence, arguing that the two roles are not mutually exclusive. Given the sad state of our academic guidance and general counseling at this school, however, it seems obvious that the senior tutor should, more than anything, act as an advisor to undergraduates...
...demands of the job—to oversee the academic and personal welfare of more than 400 students—are as trying as they are indispensable. The senior tutor position is a prestigious one, justly earned by the burden of the responsibilities involved. Everything from course changes to roommate changes, and from semesters abroad to semesters off, filter through the senior tutor’s office. The good tutors will meet with students to discuss each decision; the mediocre tutors will sign forms without bothering to ask questions. The difference between the stellar and the ineffective senior tutors hinges...
Moreover, how can a senior tutor be expected to learn the nuances of each student’s academic plan of study or roommate dilemmas or counseling needs, each year? And how can a student be expected to re-explain himself to a new advisor every fall term? If anything, effective advising and counseling—and even administrating—requires consistency. Not only must it be of stellar quality, by means of personal attention and genuine concern by the senior tutor, but it should also be reliable and consistent. High turnover rates and short terms belie that very...
...through without any guidance at all. First-year advising is appallingly impersonal, and especially cruel given the fact that such negligence takes place during our first two semesters at the College. Upperclass students, however, have a chance at genuine, personal advising. The houses support a staff of residential tutors that specialize in a number of different academic subjects, and there are enough of them that students can actually receive individual attention. And they are lead by a senior tutor who should oversee the student’s academic and personal well-being...
...might be that aspiring academics do not quite fit the senior tutor bill. First, there is no reason that a would-be professor would be able to perform the senior tutor’s responsibilities better than any other. And, second, academics undergo publish-or-perish strains that others dont have to grapple with. Undergraduates need concerned and informed senior tutors who value student success above their own, and who prioritize advising and counseling above managing and administrating. And once the College finds such stellar senior tutors, they need to make every effort to hold onto them...