Tutoring Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

W.Va. Partners With Tutor.com To Provide Free, Live Tutoring Daily For All Ages

Through a new partnership with Tutor.com, West Virginians of all ages now have access to free, real time, online tutoring, test prep and job help. West Virginians can access these resources by visiting TutorWV.com.

Through a new partnership with Tutor.com, West Virginians of all ages now have access to free, real time, online tutoring, test prep and job help.

West Virginians can access these resources by visiting TutorWV.com. Curator of the West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture and History Randall Reid-Smith announced the partnership Wednesday in a regular media briefing with Gov. Jim Justice.

“It’s from 10 o’clock in the morning to 10 o’clock at night. There’s 200 subjects that you can study,” Reid-Smith said. “It’s by grade level, it’s by subjects, and all you got to do is go [online], and you click a purple button that says ‘connect now.’ And that takes you to all of the wonderful live tutoring.”

Along with live tutoring, students can use a drop-off review service for essays and math problems.

If students choose to create a free account, they can keep working with the same tutor. The website also has self-guided resources, such as practice quizzes, video lessons and test-preparation resources like the ACT.

“[TutorWV.com] can help people prepare for their SATs, for their LSATs for law school and for their MCAT for medical school,” Reid-Smith said. “So it’s a great, great opportunity.”

Jobseekers also have access to a plethora of resources, such as live interview preparation, help with job searches and applications, and resume and cover letter help. An expert will respond to these submissions within 12 hours.

“I’m incredibly proud to support this program and look forward to seeing the positive impact it’ll have on our state,” Justice said in a news release. “Since taking office, my administration has made it a priority to improve our academic programs. We owe it to our students to give them the best opportunities imaginable. On top of that, this program also addresses the need for career growth for our citizens.”

A similar announcement was made last week for some southern West Virginia counties where 7th and 8th graders have 24/7 access to academic support through Tutor.com. This program is through a partnership with GEAR Up Southern West Virginia.

Online Academic Resources Now Available For Southern W.Va. Students

Students in some southern counties will soon have access to online academic help.

Students and their families from Mercer, Monroe, Summers, Raleigh and Wyoming counties currently enrolled in 7th or 8th grade can now access 24/7 academic support via Tutor.com. Students and parents can connect with a live tutor during sessions, drop off writing samples or assignments to get direct feedback on assignments, prepare for tests and more.

The online resources are made available to students via a partnership between Tutor.com and GEAR UP Southern West Virginia (SWV).

Program Director Kristen O’Sullivan, said GEAR UP is a national Department of Education program to help young people in economically challenged areas to reach post-secondary education.

“GEAR UP Southern West Virginia is a grant that, through Concord University, we just received in 2022-2023,” she said. “We work with a cohort of students that started with the sixth and seventh grade last year, and now they’re in seventh and eighth grade. We will follow them all the way through until their first year of post-secondary education, whether that be a four-year school, a two-year degree, the military, and we just do everything possible with them to help them be prepared and to believe that they belong and have a plan for the future.”

Tutor.com is also a resource to help parents gain confidence while helping students with schoolwork. As a native of southern West Virginia, O’Sullivan said she would have loved this kind of support when raising her own children.

“I can just remember those nights when they were struggling with something in math or struggling with certain pieces of papers they were working on, where I didn’t feel I had the capacity to be able to help them much,” she said. “Parents will no longer have to worry about that, they will have those experts right there at all times to be able to help.”

O’Sullivan said that teachers will also benefit with access to the same resources, as well as reports on what the students have been getting tutoring on.

“A teacher, let’s say in a math class, may want to be able to look back and see what are the areas the students are continuing to have questions about, so that they can then address them again in the classroom,” she said.

O’Sullivan acknowledged that internet access continues to be an issue in southern West Virginia and across the state, but implementation of COVID-19 era strategies can help to bridge the gap.

“I can tell you that Tutor.com is fully accessible from cell phones as well as from computers,” she said. “I know a lot of families, that is their internet is using their cell phone, they don’t have internet services in their homes. There’s also the things that we have learned through COVID to help people in our rural communities. They can access internet in our community libraries, in the schools, a lot of times this program will be used not just at home, but will be used in after school programming, lunchtime programming sometimes before school.”

Students younger than 13 must submit a signed permission slip before accessing the online resources.

W.Va. Afterschool Programs To Receive A Boost From Federal Grant

The money is part of the 2024 Nita M. Lowey 21st Century Community Learning Centers grant.

Six organizations in West Virginia will be awarded federal grant money to support afterschool programs.

The money is part of the 2024 Nita M. Lowey 21st Century Community Learning Centers grant.

The six organizations include:

World Vision in Barbour County
Boys and Girls Club of the Eastern Panhandle in Berkeley County
Southern Educational Services Cooperative in Fayette, Summers and Webster counties
Step By Step in Kanawha County
Marion County Schools
Playmates Preschool and Childcare Centers in Wayne County

Funds are renewable for up to five years, as long as there’s continued support from the U.S. Department of Education.

The six awardees will offer learning and development support, homework assistance, tutoring, assistance in obtaining state educational standards and enrichment activities that complement their regular academic programs during out-of-school times, according to a news release.

Grantees are also required to engage with parents and caregivers in their children’s learning.

West Virginia Public Broadcasting reached out to the West Virginia Department of Education for dollar amounts for each of the six organizations, but they did not respond before this story was published.