Tutoring Policies
Please thoroughly read through the following policies which are designed to ensure a pleasant and productive tutoring session and working relationship between your family and myself as your private tutor.
Pricing: My tutoring services are priced at an hourly rate which will be discussed prior to our first tutoring sessions. These prices are firm and will not be bartered or negotiated under any circumstances. When you make the decision to have your child tutored you are deciding to financially invest in their short and long term academic success. As a parent, you may have done a lot of research before selecting a tutor and undoubtedly, price is a factor in your ultimate decision. You have tons of options when looking for a tutor and while many companies highlight the respective benefits of their organization that may be attractive to you, here are some of the factors I incorporate into my pricing structure:
1. Qualification: I am a college educated, fully certified teacher in the state of Texas. I only tutor in subjects I have background and training in so that you can be confident that I am familiar with the content and knowledge involved in teaching it. Many tutoring franchises cannot guarantee a certified teacher or even a college graduate will be working with your child. In addition, they cannot guarantee that the individual working with your child has had any real teaching experience that will benefit your child. They may select them based on GPA, standardized test scores or other criteria that, while possibly helpful in terms of assuring that they “know” the material, it doesn’t always mean they can “teach” the material, or that they will provide customized lessons to fit your child’s needs as they work with them.
2. Experience: I have over 15 years of working in the public educational system. I have taught in both elementary and secondary schools and I am very familiar with academic standards, methods of teaching, how children learn, state assessments, and much more that position me to not just be a tutor, but to be a good tutor. Furthermore, I know what learning gaps to look for when working with your children, and how to fill them as well as the right questions to ask to get to the root of what is causing difficulties for them so that they can be successful!
3. Time & Resources: As a parent, you may think the time that I spend helping your child begins when I arrive at your home and ends when I leave. However, I invest a lot of time preparing for your child’s lessons each week on my own time. Unlike other companies who use a predesigned program for your child, I work closely with them to design lessons and activities that are beneficial to their unique needs and areas of growth, rather than using a one-size-fits-all approach. In addition, I supply all learning materials which involves purchasing resources, paper, ink, subscriptions to online programs and other tools that will be used to help your child during our time together.
4. Convenience: I offer an online tutoring service that allows me to virtually teach your child. This saves you precious time that you may be spending to take your child to a learning center or other facility-based academic environment. That also means you can cook dinner, do laundry, or attend to other important priorities while your child is being tutored in an environment that is familiar and comfortable to them.
5. Passion: I truly LOVE what I do as a tutor. I love working with students one-on-one. I love encouraging them to be confident and see the best in their abilities. I love watching them grow and learn or master a new concept. I love being an extension of your family as I work closely with your children and share in your desires of excellence for them. To that end, I put in a lot of work refining and sharpening my skills as an educator. I stay abreast of new teaching methods, keep my educator’s licenses current and work hard to be an asset to your family.
With this in mind, it is sometimes hard to put a number on what value I provide your family, but I aim to do so in a manner that is fair and honorable to the service I offer as well as the qualifications I possess. While I am not always able to offer the most “affordable” service compared to other tutors or companies, I can promise to always offer one that is “valuable.” Furthermore, my price is set at my discretion and can change at any time.
Payment: All payments will be made by PayPal transaction before a tutoring session is confirmed. You do not need a PayPal account to submit payment. PayPal accepts all forms of debit and credit card payments. Payment for your child’s tutoring session is expected at the beginning of each week and will cover all sessions of tutoring for the week based on a 6 day week. For example, if your child meets with me four times a week your payment will be equal to the daily tutoring hours X hourly rate. I will always give you a reminder of when your next weekly payment is due. Please note that payments not made prior to 12pm on the scheduled day of tutoring you will incur a n additional $15 late fee penalty and you may also run the risk of losing your child’s place on my tutoring calendar for failure to pay on time.
In addition, all sessions must be used within the time frame for which you have paid unless there is a special circumstance such as a holiday or an inclement weather day, or other circumstance that you have discussed with me. Otherwise if you miss a tutoring session and do not make it up, your payment will be forfeited.
Contacting Me: For your reference, my personal phone number is 214.875.1528 and my email address info@otherswillnotice.com. If you should call, text or email me, I will try to return your correspondence as soon as possible. Please be mindful that I may be tutoring another person’s child when you attempt to contact me or that I may be unavailable for other reasons. In general, texting is the fastest way to communicate with me. Furthermore, to maintain a suitable work/like balance, my official of hours of correspondence between myself and clients is from 9:00 am 7:00 pm Monday-Friday. If you should contact me outside of those hours there may be a delay in my response.
Tutor Session Scheduling: Generally, my schedule is made on a as needed basis. To that end, my schedule is designed to accommodate as many students as possible while prioritizing travel radius and time slots available. As a result, once it is finalized I do not allow changes to occur unless extenuating circumstances call for it and there is no guarantee that your child’s space on my calendar will be the same from week to week, but I will always give ample notice to make arrangements and give updates as needed.
Scheduled Sessions: All tutoring sessions are to begin and end at the agreed upon times unless an otherwise mutually agreed upon schedule change is made. Once you have selected your tutoring day and time, changes will not be able to be made unless permissible by my schedule. Examples of this would include changing from a Monday to a Tuesday session at the same time as previously arranged or asking me to arrive an hour or half an hour early or stay later than agreed or requesting changes to be made based off your child’s new extracurricular activities. Many times, my schedule, travel time and other considerations do not allow me this type of flexibility, please keep this in mind when scheduling with me and be sure that the time and days we agree on will be a good fit for you.
In addition, I am aware that many families and children participate in athletic activities and other extracurricular activities. While I am excited to hear that your children are doing something they love, please be sure that any activities you enroll them in are compatible with their tutoring schedule as I will not be making changes to the schedule to accommodate those activities. Furthermore, I have my own personal time commitments, obligations and interests that I will not be rescheduling, postponing or otherwise altering in order to meet any special scheduling requests that you may have. My great appreciation for your understanding and adherence to this expectation.
Start and End Times: I will make all attempts to log on at least five minutes prior to the start of the session in order to set up the study area and will remain for five minutes after the session has ended to answer any questions you may have. The five minutes before and after the session are the only times that are not included in the actual time your child is being tutored. In order for your child to receive all of the time included in their session, it is important that they are logged on and prepared with necessary supplies and a suitable work space is provided so that we may begin on time. If there are extenuating circumstances that may cause our session to begin late, please let me know ahead of time so that schedule adjustments can be made if possible. Otherwise, unless previously notified, any circumstance that causes our session to start late will take time away from the tutoring session and will not be added to the end of the session.
An example of this would be if your child is unprepared to begin an hour-long session that starts at 4:00 and we actually begin at 4:10. Or if you are running late picking them up from school or other activity. The session would still end at 5:00 in order to respect both my time as well as your time. Please be aware that circumstances which prevent me from teaching your child including excessive distractions from environmental noise in the home, unruly pets, disrespectful/defiant students, etc. may result in the session ending early, however full payment will still be expected for the session.
In addition, I reserve the right to discontinue tutoring sessions with your child if the environment, meeting place, pets, or behavior of your child consistently and seriously impedes the facilitation of learning. Please be sure that your home or designated work space is conducive to a productive learning experience for your child. This includes having a suitable works space such as a table or desk which is free of excessive clutter so that we may have room to work in a manner that is helpful to your child.
Likewise, it is important for sessions to end on time so that I may honor my schedule and other clients. As previously stated, at the end of each session, I will have five minutes to discuss your child’s progress and answer questions. For example, if your child’s session ends at 4:00, I will conference with you until 4:05.
If you have additional questions or comments you may contact me via phone at 214.875.1528 or email me at info@otherswillnotice.com.
Follow-up conferences that cause me to be unable to leave your home or tutoring meeting place within five minutes will be charged to the client at a rate of $10.00 per five minutes past the scheduled ending time. My services as a tutor are only granted within the time allotted that you have paid for. To this end, if your child is working on an assignment from either myself or their school teacher, and it is not completed during our session, it is not my responsibility to assist them in finishing it in the time between the end of our current session and our next session. Furthermore, if your child is working on a math assignment and would like me to review it before they submit it outside of our regularly scheduled tutoring time, you may first contact me to ask if I have time to do review it and then you may email it to me for an additional fee of $20.
Cancellations: Working with a private tutor is a commitment that should be prioritized in order to see the desired improvement in your child’s academic performance. To that end, cancellations that do not include arrangements for a make-up session will include a 100% cancellation fee. This means that if you cancel a session that you do not arrange with me to make up, you will forfeit that portion of your weekly payment that will not be refunded. Also if you cancel a session 60 minutes prior to the arranged tutoring time for any reason you will be charged 50% of the rate for that session and the additional fee will need to be repaid before the next session. In addition, if your child has missed 3 consecutive tutoring sessions for any reason, I reserve the right to remove them from my tutoring schedule.
Furthermore, there are times of the year such as during Winter Break, Spring Break and Summer Vacation that I may be more lenient with this policy as many people are traveling and away from home. However, any special considerations you may have need to be made to me at least 7 days in advance and there is no guarantee that I will hold your child’s place on my calendar for extended periods of time such as if you are taking a long vacation or want to take a break from tutoring.
Make Up Sessions: If you cancel a session and want to make it up, I currently offer make up session time on Saturday from 10am to 2:00pm. This is the only time I will make myself available for make-up sessions so please keep this in mind. When you decide to do a make-up session, your child will be scheduled for a session as soon as possible, but please keep in mind that I only offer make-up sessions once a week and there may be other families ahead of you that have scheduled make-up sessions before I can get to your child. Additionally, scheduling a make-up session is the only way to guarantee that you will not forfeit any portion of your payment that may be lost due to a cancellation.
The following days are considered holidays and any tutoring session that falls on these days may be missed and not made up: New Year’s Day, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s Birthday, July 1st (my birthday) President’s Day, Good Friday, Easter Sunday, Mother’s Day, Memorial Day, Father’s Day, Independence Day (July 4th), Labor Day, Veteran’s Day, Thanksgiving Day Break (Includes Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday), Christmas Break (Includes Christmas Eve through New Year’s Day).
In addition, I will take an annual vacation in July of every Summer, as well as some extra dates throughout the year for personal reasons, those dates will be given ahead of time to allow for rescheduling accommodations. There may also be times when I am ill or have an emergency that will cause me to have to cancel a session. I will always attempt to reschedule sessions in these instances.
Hold Fees: If your family decides to take a vacation/trip/break and would like to preserve your child’s place on my tutoring schedule, a hold fee equal to 65% of your normal tutoring fees will be required during the weeks that they are absent from tutoring. During the Summer months, I will allow one missed session for no charge. Otherwise, any additional missed sessions we be assessed at 65% of your normal tutoring fees. If you elect NOT to pay a hold fee while you are away, your space will be given to another family and there is no guarantee that your child will be able to resume tutoring with me once you return.
Sick Children & Behavior: If your child is sick, running a fever or has a contagious illness please cancel our tutoring session. My health is a priority to me and although you may think it is okay to have a sick child tutored because they are at home, I do not wish to work with your children if they are sick. Not only does it pose a threat to my health, but sick children do not learn well. Also, if your children are ill-mannered or do not behave, I may leave before the end of our session. I realize that children have unique needs and that you may tolerate certain behavior in your home, however, I expect your child to listen to instructions the first time I give them. If your child’s behavior is of concern to me, I will always take a pause in the session to allow you to correct it, after that, I will end the session at my discretion if it does not improve and your payment for that session will be forfeited.
Canceling Tutoring Services: Neither I, nor you are contractually bound to agree to any time duration as it concerns the length of time tutoring services will be provided to your child. With this in mind, either you or I may end our tutoring arrangement at any time. However, there are certain conditions and expectations that come with this. If you would like to end your child’s tutoring with me I ask for a 7-day notice so that I may make arrangements for a new student. If you cancel tutoring during a week that you have already paid for, you will not receive a refund for any unused tutoring sessions.
Likewise, if I wish or find it necessary to discontinue tutoring your child, I will make every effort to let you know 7-days prior. If for some unusual reason I elect to discontinue tutoring your child in the middle of a week you have already paid for I will refund any unused sessions you have.
Thank you very much for allowing me to teach your child as their private tutor. It is always my goal to provide the very best in time, attention and planning to help them do well academically. The above listed policies help set expectations for both you and I to ensure that your child’s needs are met effectively and efficiently. If you have questions, please do not hesitate to ask for clarification.
Dr. Marco Walder