Re: wc's, faculty referral, student resposibility (fwd)

[Twila.Yates.Papay@Rollins.Edu]

A quick response to Mieke:  All our peer consultants are paid minimum 
wage the first year they work, and get a 10-cent-per-hour pay raise in 
following years.  As most are hired as juniors (a few as seniors), it 
doesn't go too high, though a few stay into a graduate year or two.  So 
they all get the same pay rate, though graduate programs and the evening 
division have contributed money to my budget to pay for peer consultants 
from their programs.  No one gets rich on this work (I figure--let them 
in on that sad truth early!), and I try to make lots of professional 
opportunities available so that they get valuable experience, 
internships, resume-builders, etc.

Volunteers usually work fewer hours per week than the paid peer 
consultants.  We have a set schedule of hours, and we try to give 
everyone their first, second, or third requests.  (Returning consultants 
get scheduled before new ones.)  Evening and graduate students work in 
some specified hours when we're sure their clientele can come.  (We have 
no day students working Saturday morning or Sunday afternoon, for 
example.  Other popular hours for these non-day consultants are through 
the week from 4:30-6:30, so we have more consultants on duty at those 
times, and through the evening on Sunday.)  

Volunteers are added to the schedule after the regular hours are set.  We 
tell them all our heaviest demand times, and they usually select 2-6 hours 
within that framework.  Then we just add them to the schedule book, 
noting that they are volunteers.  (Volunteers may white their names out 
of the book if they are going out of town, put paid consultants have to 
trade hours with someone else to be sure their times are covered.)

Our budget is not great, which is why I added the community volunteers to 
help us out with busy times.  The Center is open Su 1-11, M-Th 10 am-11 pm,
Fr 10-2, Sa 9-11 am.

twila yates papay
typapay@rollins.edu  

On Mon, 4 Nov 1996, Eric Crump wrote:

> 
> 
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Mon, 4 Nov 1996 12:24:41 -500
> From: Mieke Koppen Tucker <mktucker.faculty.users.main.Bishops@ubishops.ca>
> Reply-To: "Moderated Writing Center forum." <WCENTR-L@MIZZOU1.MISSOURI.EDU>
> To: Multiple recipients of list WCENTR-L <WCENTR-L@MIZZOU1.MISSOURI.EDU>
> Subject: Re: wc's, faculty referral, student resposibility (fwd)
> 
> I've been following this discussion with some interest, and am very
> curious about the diverse staff model recommended with such
> enthusiasm below.  What about pay rates?  Are they various?  Are
> volunteers seen as threatening the number of hours that the original
> tutors would want to work?  Or is your demand so great (and your
> budget so generous) that everyone gets the hours they want?
> 
> These are some of the problems I would have to deal with if I followed
> Twila's very interesting - and I must admit exciting - suggestions.
> 
> Mieke
> 
> 
> >      I suggest in your own case that the solution is simple--hire some real
> > peer tutors: undergraduates.  Your Center dynamics would change dramatically
>  if
> > you varied your staff.  At Rollins our first peer writing consultants were
> > day program (usually age 20-22).  Later I got to hire a few Holt School peer
> > consultants (older, "nontraditional"), then 3 graduate students; now we also
> > have "community volunteers," some being retired professionals.  This has given
> > us a very diverse staff.  They all take the same training course,
> > discovering how much they have to learn from their clients--and each other.
> >      So all groups benefit from exchanging information--and clients still
> > seem to sign up for the most convenient times, rather than checking the
> > credentials of the peer consultant.
> >
> > Twila Papay
> 
>