The Underbelly: (Teaching and Tutoring - Part II)

Thoughts for today centre on that most unsavory and taboo of subjects: money. Well, not really, but money is at the root of it. Forgive me if you find this crass. Forgive me if you find this self-indulgent.

As an avid hockey player, but mild fan, I’ve been asked many times over the last few weeks for my thoughts on the NHL situation. Well, I’m getting tired of commenting on it over and over again, so I’m going to say something about it just to flush it out of my system. I do this knowing full well that this particular readership circle has absolutely no interest. For this, I must apologize in advance.

I understand how the players feel, but I have no sympathy for them. Their position is ultimately about money, although they insist it is really not – that it is based on ideology. The strength and loyalty to which they currently uphold their position is based on a certain moral indignation formed and developed only recently from within the animosity of tense negotiation. From their narrow view of the world, they are correct except their principle is flawed. They want to be paid at the same level as athletes of other major North American pro sports. The hockey players believe they are deserving because they are the best at what they do, just as the other ball players are the best at what they do. The market conditions don’t allow this. There are only two options. Accept the owners’ offer, or don’t play. There is not a third option.

I’m thinking about cutting back on my private tutoring. I know I’ve indicated before that teaching is something that fulfills me, something that I love to do, but there are necessary elements to it that are becoming more and more difficult all the time. Money. Not cash itself, but the principle of money. I charge people for my private tutoring. I enjoy doing this and I don’t particularly need the money, but I think what I’m doing is very valuable and therefore people should pay for it. I do not solicit. People approach me, yet in spite of this, too many times in the past I’ve had people try to fight me over my rate.

To make a comparison and to state an opinion to which you may disagree; to my mind there is just no question that tutoring for a professional accounting program is worth more than tutoring for grade school math. The benefit/ end result is more tangible, immediate and direct. I am teaching working adults, who if they pass exams, will be qualified for better jobs that will earn them more money. Now. That is an indisputable fact. The people who come to me do so because they do not believe they can pass without my help. That is also a fact.

What acts against me is the reality that people are willing to give and sacrifice everything and anything if it is for their kids. And often they are not willing or able to spend anything on themselves. Correct or incorrect, equitable or not, this is a truth I have to accept. This is the basic premise that enables grade school tutors to charge more money for their services than I do for mine. I believe what I provide is more valuable, but I cannot be compensated for what I believe is its true worth. There are only two options. Accept what the market will bear, or don’t tutor. There is not a third option.

Because money is sometimes just a principle, there are certain circumstances when I will relax my financial requirements. I will be tutoring SD starting in April. This will be her fourth attempt on this exam and this is her very last course. If she does not pass this time, she will be asked to withdraw and her years of work will be for naught. Her entire sense of self-worth is wrapped up in this exam. For a desperate case like this, sometimes I will be flexible.

Her case is much different to what I have going on right now. Last week I just finished up tutoring a couple of guys for the March exam. They asked me to spend an extra session with them for free. Free. No charge. They decided they couldn’t pay me anymore. I stared right through them and listened with indifference to their hardship story about being new Canadians and being forced to accept low paying jobs that were beneath them, how in their home country they were so much more etc etc. whatever !!! . . . This is the sort of thing that enrages me, and not just because we had already made an arrangement they were now trying to re-work. This was the first attempt at this course for both of them. There was no prior evidence that the content was difficult for them or that they needed professional expertise or guidance. Most people study independently – on their own. These two guys wanted a tutor because it saves time studying. Put another way, they were paying for a luxury. In this circumstance, I am very stubborn. I hold no regard for hardship stories.

My “favourite” hardship was the outlandish case of BT who three years ago “decided” for him only, I should reduce my rate by exactly one-half because another tutor, SW charges half. I would not, and told him to contact SW instead, a suggestion he clearly did not take to. Upon seeing that merely asking would not yield the desired outcome, he decided to just come out and be “open” and upfront. He told me he could not pay my rate; it was too much of a burden given his “situation”. His “situation” was that he has five children and they were all “sick” and often he had to take time off work and couldn’t earn money. . . . . . . A heartfelt story, yet I am strangely unmoved. His next idea to aid in his financial relief, was for me to spend twice as much time with him per session, thereby still allowing me to earn the same amount of money I would otherwise. It’s wasn’t ever clear to me how this was supposed to “lift” his financial burden. Eventually I did tutor him but the sessions were poison. He coerced a friend to join him. This other person was there for the sole purpose of helping pay me but otherwise was obviously not interested. Mid-way, we had a disruption due to the three week trip to Africa BT took with his “sick” children.

Then there was the woman who asked me to wait two months before payment because she felt her liability should be contingent upon her passing . . . .

I love doing the lectures, but I want to cut back on my private tutoring. I said this last year too, but didn’t. The spring lecture session hasn’t even started yet and I already have four people I will be tutoring, so it looks like this year I will not either. I did an all day review session on the weekend and M. from my workplace was on site but at a session for another course. She told me later there were people in her session who had taken my class or review before and they were talking amongst themselves, saying many flattering things about me. No one’s ego no matter how humble, is immune, but what a nasty trick that is – saying those things to keep me from quitting.