Open thread, September 8-14, 2014

polymathwannabe

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Notes for future OT posters:

1. Please add the 'open_thread' tag.

2. Check if there is an active Open Thread before posting a new one.

3. Open Threads should be posted in Discussion, and not Main.

4. Open Threads should start on Monday, and end on Sunday.

Has anyone ever worked for Varsity Tutors before? I'm looking at applying to them as an online tutor, but I don't know their track record from a tutor point of view. Has anyone had any experience with them?

Never worked for them in particular, but my experience with such online tutoring businesses hasn't been great: generally don't get many hours, are expected to commit fully to being available at certain times every week (which when in uni, with tests etc. at unexpected times, isn't too possible - might be possible for you in your situation) and they take a fair chunk of your earnings. On one occasion I put a lot of time into signing up, getting documents etc. to verify myself, and then never got a single student. On the other hand, signing up for services s... (read more)

1[anonymous]12y

I haven't worked with that specific company before, but there are a lot of mixed incentives in the tutor market. If we can believe Glassdoor, they offer around $20/hour. (I suspect the 2 reported at $30/hour are either grad students or some other specialization). Here are some employee reviews, but I expect two of the five-stars are faked. Judging by the reviews and my own experience in the past, I think you can expect to get around five hours a week of tutoring this way. That doesn't include time spent preparing for topics and other overhead. I imagine the only way the company maintains quality control is by reducing hours on tutors after one or two bad reviews, or after a single refund request. Office politics wrt the director-tutor relationship are probably going to be brutal, and there's not going to be any reward or incentive for doing an above-average job. It seems reasonable to assume turnover is high. Since you're looking for online tutoring, I assume it's not possible to tutor in person in your local area?

2James_Miller12y

Tutoring seems like a great way for lots of LW people to earn extra money. Apparently at least one high end tutor earns $1000 an hour.

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