Peer Consultants/Adjunct Consultants -Reply

[Charlotte Smith <Smithc@acc.sunyacc.edu>]

At ACC we have a mix of faculty and student
tutors, and the writing center brochure each
semester includes the schedule, with
faculty, peer, and reading tutors indicated.
Since this is a two-year school, peer tutors
are "merely" sophomores, so you might
think that students would usually choose a
faculty tutor for his/her expertise.  However,
we've found that this is NOT the case; in
fact, we've found that most students don't
care whether they're working with a faculty
member or a peer, and that when they
choose, it's about 50/50. 

I see a couple of main reasons for this.
Perhaps students think they'll get more
sympathy from a peer tutor--about half of
ACC's students are older returning
students, with little confidence about their
writing. But it may also be that, other than
the names in the brochure, it's difficult to
distinguish a faculty tutor from a peer
tutor--many of our peer tutors are older than
the faculty! So a student dropping in to the
center can't easily tell who's what.

Charlotte

Charlotte Smith
Director, Center for Reading and Writing
Adirondack Community College
Queensbury, NY 12804