Tutoring

Tutoring is free to all UM students. Tutoring sessions typically last 30-60 minutes and are held in The Writing Center in Liberal Arts 144 and in the Mansfield Library. On Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings, tutoring in Liberal Arts 144 is reserved for ESL students only. You may visit The Writing Center for tutoring as often as you like, within reasonable limits. To arrange for tutoring at regular intervals throughout the semester, please contact the Writing Center 243-2266.

How to Make an Appointment

Use our web based scheduler to make an appointment. If you have not used the scheduler before, you will need to register before logging in. Appointments are recommended, especially in the second half of the semester; however, drop-in tutoring is also available on a first-come, first-served basis.

What to bring

Whether you want help with a writing assignment, scholarship essay, or speech, you should bring any and all written instructions you have for your writing task. The tutor’s ability to help you meet high writing standards is limited if he or she does not know what you are being asked to do. In addition, you should bring notes, an outline, or a draft of the paper you are working on. If you have a statement of your instructor’s writing expectations (often found in the course syllabus), you should bring this along as well.

If you are seeing a tutor in order to examine the results of your performance on the Upper Division Writing Proficiency Assessment, the tutor will provide you with your exam and any other materials you need to understand your result. All UDWPA exams are stored at The Writing Center for two calendar years; you may pick yours up whenever The Writing Center is open.

What to expect

Each time you visit The Writing Center you will be asked to fill out a brief log-in slip that we use only to count students and visits. Once the tutoring session begins, the tutor will ask you a few questions about your writing issues. He/she will also ask you for the written instructions (if any) for the assignment that you are working on. You and the tutor will work together to analyze the writing task and develop a strategy for addressing it. The tutor will model the strategy for you and then you will practice it briefly before the session ends. During the session the tutor may offer specific advice about how to build or improve a piece of writing. However, the tutor will not proofread, edit, or correct drafts or contact individual instructors to inquire about an assignment.

How to benefit

Tutors in the Writing Center are committed to improving your writing skills, not your grade on a particular paper. Consequently, we recommend that you schedule an appointment with a tutor well before the due date of a writing assignment. You may need time to rethink or revise your paper once you have met with a tutor. For example, one result of your first tutoring session may be that you discover that you do not have a clear understanding of the assignment. You will then need time to contact the instructor before you begin to compose a paper.

Your goal in visiting The Writing Center should be to gradually acquire better writing skills to support your academic and professional efforts. These visits should be timely and repeated. Because good revising takes time, tutors cannot usefully review papers minutes before they are due.

Cancel an appointment

You can cancel your appointment on the web based scheduler by checking the Delete this Reservation box when you (re)open your appointment window. Repeated failure to cancel appointments that you do not attend, will result in the loss of tutoring privileges.