Tutoring Center Effectiveness: The Effect of Drop-In Tutoring

Abstract

While tutoring as a whole has been demonstrated to improve student learning across a variety of subjects and age groups, there is little published evidence for the effectiveness of drop-in tutoring at the undergraduate level. This type of tutoring can be derided as homework help; however, it is clear from this study that students who made use of the Tutoring Center (TC) regularly gained more academically than simply help with an individual class. In fact students who visited the TC more than 10 times per quarter had approximately 10% higher rates of persistence and approximately 0.2 points higher average GPA's than students who infrequently visited or who do not visit the TC during their first year of college.

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Notes on contributors

Erik Cooper

Erik Cooper completed this research while working as the Coordinator of the Tutoring Center at Western Washington University. He received a B.A. in Psychology from California State University Sacramento and an M.S. in Psychology/Neuroscience from the University of Oregon. Erik worked as a professional tutor for five years before working at Western Washington University. He currently works as the Director of Planning, Research, and Student Success at Yuba College in California. Current research interests include peer tutoring, effectiveness of academic interventions, student learning outcomes, and basic skills development. Erik can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected].