How To Become A Tutor

We’re looking for teachers, tutors and articulate people who'd like to work with us and can present effective part-time or full-time lessons anywhere within Greater New York City. Greater New York City is composed of the five boroughs of New York City, Long Island, Westchester and the lower Hudson Valley. This area is composed of the following boroughs and counties: Brooklyn, Bronx, Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island, Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, Putnam, Dutchess, Rockland, Orange, Ulster and Sullivan. This is the part of New York State served by telephone area codes 212, 347, 516, 631, 646, 718, 845, 914 and 917.

This page covers the following topics:

• What's Special About Our Tutoring Service

• Our Background  

• The Subjects And Grades Most In Demand

• How Much Do We Pay Out Tutors

• The Requirements To Become One Of Our Tutors  

• How To Apply

• A Word Of Caution About Filing Out The Application  

• In Conclusion

What's Special About Our Tutoring Service   Top Of Page

Before you dismiss us as just another one of those tutoring services, here are five important things you should know about us:

1.     Whenever one of our tutors gives a lesson, the family pays the tutor the full fee due for that lesson at its conclusion. On the last day of the month, the tutor, without leaving his home, uses Paypal to send us our portion of the fees. This means you'd never have to wait to receive your earnings; you'd receive your pay in full right away at the end of each lesson.

2.    All lessons are scheduled according to the preferences of the tutor and the family. After we call with the details about a new student, the tutor calls up the family to discuss the problems which need to be solved. If the tutor wants to come at 10:00 PM Wednesday or at 9:00  AM Sunday, and the family agrees with the selection, then it’s always OK with us. In fact, almost every student can successfully have lessons somewhere between 3:00 PM and 11:00 PM Monday to Friday and all day Saturday and Sunday. If you were one of our tutors, you'd always be able to choose the day and time you prefer to give lessons.

3.    Private tutoring is very different than classroom instruction. The only requirements for successful tutoring are: thorough knowledge of the course, clear and articulate explanation of that course content to the student and a successful conclusion with the student fully able to manage the course on his own. Since this is our main concern, we’re NOT interested in state certificates, city licenses, graduate degrees, fingerprints, lesson plans, etc, etc.  Our only goal is to have complete understanding of the course pass effectively and smoothly from the teacher’s brain to that of the student. Therefore, it’s entirely possible to successfully tutor subjects and grades for which the teacher doesn’t have classroom experience, licenses, certificates or degrees.

4.    The hardest part of being a tutor is finding enough students to tutor. Since most tutors have access to just one or two sources of students, they are forced to spend a lot time hoping and waiting for their schedules to fill up. We, on the other hand, have provided tutoring lessons since 1955 during which time we’ve cultivated many excellent sources of students. In fact, we’ve had to hire more tutors during the past few years to take care of the ever increasing demand for tutoring. So, if you'd like to be one of our tutors and get lots more students, we can definitely help you.

5.    Legally, our tutors are NOT considered salaried employees and are  NOT subject to monthly payroll deductions and an annual W-2 form. We are NOT required by law to make any deductions for social security or withholding taxes. All taxes to be paid on any tutoring income are entirely the responsibility of the tutor.

If you’re considering seeking a tutoring position with us, it’s essential you set aside a great deal of time needed to read both this web page and The Tutor's Handbook slowly, seriously, carefully and completely. In the past, many prospective tutors who came across these two web pages skimmed briefly through them, saw our phone number, called us up and asked us what they had to do to become a tutor with us. This is very discouraging to hear when all the answers sought can already be found in these two web pages. The reason these two web pages are so long and time-consuming is we tried very hard to make them complete and give you all the details you’d need to make an informed decision about working with us. So, we ask you to give this two pages a very serious reading and hope you’ll decide to tutor for us.

Our Background   Top Of Page

Since 1955,  we've provided adult, experienced, professional teachers for expert, one-to-one, home instruction throughout Greater New York City. We help students, parents, educators and agencies overcome academic difficulties and excel in educational endeavors. Our teachers thoroughly test their students to pinpoint strengths and weaknesses, identify deficiencies holding them back and learn exactly which topics need to be taught. They maintain very high standards of professionalism to maximize their effectiveness and help their students realize their full potential.

The Subjects And Grades Most In Demand   Top Of Page

We seek teachers, tutors and other articulate, intelligent people to explain academic subjects and tests at all grades and levels to elementary, high school, college and adult students. Since 1955, almost 90% of our tutoring requests have been for lessons in one or more of the following four subject areas:

1. Elementary school math (Grades 1 to 8)

2. High school math (especially Elementary Algebra (Grade 9) and, to a lesser extent, Plane Geometry (Grade 10) and Intermediate Algebra/Trigonometry (Grade 11)

3. Elementary school reading (Grades 1 to 8)

4. High school science (especially Chemistry and Physics).

Although most of our requests for tutoring are in these four subject areas, we do get some calls for other subjects. In math, we get calls for precalculus, calculus and statistics. In reading, we get calls for the Orton-Gillingham method. In foreign languages, we get calls for Spanish, French, Italian and Latin. Among standardized tests, we get calls for GED, SAT, GRE, LAST, LSAT and TOEFL. In the area of finance, we get calls for accounting, finance and economics. If you can effectively and articulately tutor any of these subjects (as well as others we did not mention), add these to you application; we may well be able to use your services.

As is true of almost every other tutoring service in the country, we ALWAYS need more tutors to handle the ever increasing number of students seeking effective tutoring help. We intend to actively recruit suitable people during the rest of the current year as well as during the next several years. We offer excellent pay and flexible hours for both full-time and part-time positions.

How Much Do We Pay Our Tutors   Top Of Page

Our tutors earn between $20 and $45 per hour depending upon the student’s subject and location. For students who live in Brooklyn, Bronx, northern Manhattan (above 125th Street), Queens and Staten Island, tutors normally earn $30 per hour for regular students and between $20 and $30 per hour for students accepted into our sliding scale fee program. For students who live in the Upper East Side, the Upper West Side, Midtown and Lower Manhattan, tutors normally earn $45 per hour for regular students and between $30 and $45 per hour for students accepted into our sliding scale fee program. For students who live in Long Island, Westchester and the lower Hudson valley, tutors normally earn $35 per hour for regular students and between $25 and $35 per hour for students accepted into our sliding scale fee program.

Yes, we DEFINITELY need and want tutors in ALL sections of Greater New York City (New York City, Long Island, Westchester and the Lower Hudson Valley). No, teaching licenses or certificates are NOT required. Due to the incredible ongoing demand for tutoring help, we’ll CERTAINLY hire many additional adult, articulate people to augment our tutoring staff during the next several years.

The Requirements To Become One Of Our Tutors   Top Of Page

The following nine requirements must be met by EVERY applicant seeking to become one of our tutors:

1. All applicants MUST have carefully read and completely understood our How To Become A Tutor web page. In case you're a bit confused, that's the web page you're currently reading.

2. All applicants MUST have carefully read and completely understood our The Tutor's Handbook web page. This includes all six steps detailed on the web page as well as all the links you’ll find in those six steps.

3. All applicants MUST submit an accurate, truthful and completely filled-out copy of The Tutor Application.

4. All applicants MUST either possess or be within one year of receiving an associates or bachelors degree (e.g., an A.A., B.S. or B.A. degree.) We may be able to accept a number of years of life experience in place of a college degree.

5. All applicants MUST have a two-hour telephone interview with us to discuss their submitted application and their qualifications to be a teacher/tutor.

6. Although neither owning nor driving a car is required, we give preference to candidates who are in possession of a car and are able to drive to lessons.

7. Although neither teaching nor tutoring experience is required, we give definite preference to candidates who have had a number of years of such experience.

8. All applicants MUST agree to tutor with us for at least one full calendar year.

9. All applicants MUST agree to tutor for us ten or more hours per week.

How To Apply   Top Of Page

If you’d like to become one of our tutors in Kings (Brooklyn), Bronx, New York (Manhattan), Queens, Richmond (Staten Island), Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, Putnam, Rockland, Orange, Dutchess, Ulster or Sullivan Counties, you’ll find complete details by visiting our The Tutor's Handbook web page. This page will tell you EVERYTHING about becoming one on our tutors. When you read this page, you’ll see there are six steps leading to becoming one of our tutors. Please read very carefully all six steps and all the links contained in them several times. After you've learned all about us, understand what’s involved in being a tutor with us and still want to be one of our tutors, go back to step five where you'll find The Tutor Application which you need to complete. Fill it out, click the SEND button at the bottom of the page and we'll call you up within a few days to arrange the time and date of an intensive, two-hour telephone interview with you. If we find both your application and your interview to be of sufficiently high quality, we’ll immediately start referring students to you. PLEASE DO NOT FILL OUT THE APPLICATION UNTIL AFTER YOU’VE CAREFULLY READ BOTH THIS WEB PAGE AND STEPS ONE TO SIX OF The Tutor's Handbook WEB PAGE SEVERAL TIMES.

A Word Of Caution About Filling Out The Application   Top Of Page

It’s most important to realize our application is quite long, involved, complex and comprehensive. In it, you’ll need to tell us about your personal background, what subjects, grades and tests you can and wish to teach, the zip codes to which you agree to go to give lessons, your educational background and your employment history. In addition, you’ll need to answer four very important essay type questions which are designed to see how well you know and understand our basic principals and how articulately you can explain them. Indeed, for every ten people who begin filling out the application, only one is actually able to complete and submit it. And, for every three people who actually submit a completed applications to us, only one actually succeeds in becoming one of our tutors. So, don’t begin the arduous application process unless you seriously want to become one of our tutors and intend to complete the entire application process.

As is the case with almost every tutor in the country, most of our tutors already have full time (9:00 AM - 3:00 PM) teaching jobs or full time (9:00 AM - 5:00 PM) office jobs. Our tutors are always free to simultaneously tutor for other services, work for other companies or take classes in school. If you have any questions after you’ve THOROUGHLY and COMPLETELY read both this web page and our The Tutor's Handbook web page, you may phone us at (877) 674-5067. You may, if you wish, email us but don't forget to include your phone number in your message since we only respond to inquiries by telephone. Please DON’T include any attachments in your email; because of the acute threat of computer virus infections, we NEVER open and read them.

In Conclusion   Top Of Page

Keep in mind, there are four items which MUST be successfully completed in order to become a tutor with our service.

1)       All applicants MUST carefully read, understand and absorb our How To Become A Tutor web page. This includes all the hyperlinks printed in blue ink and underlined.

2)       All applicants MUST carefully read, understand and absorb our The Tutor's Handbook web page. This includes the contents of all six steps detailed on the web page as well as all the hyperlinks printed in blue ink and underlined.

3)      All applicants MUST submit an accurate, truthful, completely filled-out copy of our The Tutor Application after saving a printed-out copy for their records.

4)      All applicants MUST have an intensive two-hour telephone interview with us to discuss what they wrote on their application and their qualifications to become a teacher with our tutoring service.