Reflection 11/06

This week I only had one tutoring session- my second hour long appointment was a no show. I worked on something entirely new so far as a tutor and had a good time doing it, my tutee was a senior applying for grad schools who brought in a letter of intent. To prepare myself some I looked up some examples of good letters of intent, and researched what was most important in them. I’m glad I did this research beforehand because I was able to use a lot of that information while helping this tutee with the best outcome of her letter. Though she did bring a draft, she told me she really just put a bunch of thoughts on the page the night before and didn’t think much of it, which showed in it’s lack of a clear structure and many jumbled points. Reading through we found some basic structural errors, and I showed her how I would dissect the thoughts individually and rearrange them in a new paragraph, that way it is clear and functions well in her letter. Upon my research of good letters of intent, I noticed that many sites emphasized that professionalism is very important; it was still an opportunity to show your personality. This applied to my session tremendously, as her letter seemed very plain and could fit to any student, so we talked through how to present herself as an individual/someone worth remembering- something I found to be quite important when requesting admittance. The session went pretty well overall, we both marked on her paper simultaneously and it was a great equal effort in perfecting her letter. I suggested her coming back to have another appointment with me, as she did not intend to send this for months, and she told me she would be back. This new type of tutoring was very enjoyable, especially because working with something new increased our collaboration, it wasn’t so much of an edit-and-go situation I’ve noticed tutee’s often hope for. I felt that I was a great help to her, and the research I did before only made it easier- I definitely recommend this to tutors when they feel a bit confused.