To review for an upcoming pre-calculus test, junior Charlotte Shays listens to junior Katherine Ho's explanation of how to work out a math problem. Ho often works with students at Mathnasium where she is a part-time tutor. “I get to see the side of math where people are asking the questions that I never thought of and it builds a more solid understanding of math,” Ho said. Photo by Matteo Winandy.
Story by Katherine Harrell
THE TUTORS
Although it’s hard to calculate, Katherine Herron, owner and founder of Hola HP, estimates that her tutoring business sees an average of 300 students a day.
Herron’s tutoring journey started when she began teaching small Spanish group sessions out of her own home in 2010.
At the time, Herron was teaching eighth grade Spanish at the middle school when she decided to take on a group of former students who needed extra help with high school Spanish.
“My own small groups got to be so popular that I was teaching almost 100 kids weekly out of my small home near the high school,” Herron said. “It was then I decided to seek out an office above Banditos in 2014. I decided to name my small business Hola HP, as I was still just tutoring Spanish.”
In 2016, Herron made the decision to open up her business to all subjects with the goal to help students from prekindergarten through 12th grade in a small group environment.
“In anticipation of great registration, I signed a lease with our spot across from Bubbas on Rosedale, and then we said a prayer that students would come,” Herron said.
Due to the fact that Herron and her growing team were already tutoring a significant number of kids, along with the month-to-month commitment of their company, they were met with quick acceptance and popularity.
However, that doesn’t mean the team didn't have doubts.
“My math director, Ali Jackson, opened up five groups of math but only had about six students total,” Herron said. “I urged her to wait it out a few months, and in over a year, she managed to grow Hola’s math department to close to 200 students.”
Similarly, Lori Langston, owner and founder of The Program, started small, creating her tutoring business in her own home in 2006 after teaching at a public school for 12 years.
“Shortly after ‘retirement,’ a friend asked me to help their child in math, and right there, my new career started,” Langston said. “One student turned into 10, which quickly turned into many more. I knew at that point that there was a demand for tutoring in this area.”
Langston, who originally tutored at private schools across Dallas based from her house, changed up her business.
“As my business continued to expand from math to all subjects, I began concentrating 95% of my resources on the HP student and curriculum,” she said.
Shortly after, The Program was able to move their location to their current McFarlin Boulevard office. Word spread quickly throughout the community, and students signed up for sessions.
The Program claims to be “designed with the student's busy schedule in mind,” according to their website. Its “Flex” schedule is based on students’ quizzes and tests, so that students tutor only when needed. The Program's reviews for quizzes and tests are a couple days before the upcoming assessment, and the reviews complement the testing schedule in order to avoid multiple tutoring sessions in one week.
Langston attributes part of The Program’s success to the growing desire to be at the top of the game for college acceptance.
“I have noticed that in the past 10 years or so, popular colleges are increasing their entrance requirements and as a result students feel the need to raise their GPA and ACT or SAT scores for better opportunity of acceptance,” Langston said. “Nowadays, each fraction point of a student’s GPA can now determine which school they are accepted to, and this can drive the need for more tutoring.”
This contributes to a trend that Herron has observed of tutoring sessions being more popular with high school students than with middle school students.
“Grades go towards your GPA in high school, so the pressure to perform is greater,” she said. “In addition, the class's content is just more rigorous as you go through school, and there are fewer chances to make [up] assignments and assessments in high school.”
Additionally, the abundance of wealth in the community contributes to the success and popularity of private tutoring businesses. In 2019, the average individual income of Highland Park residents is $95,197, and the average household income is $211,136, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Approximately one in five upper-income families have hired some sort of tutor to help their child become more academically advanced as opposed to 7% of middle income families and 8% of low income families, according to a study called “Most Parents of K-12 Students Learning Online Worry About Them Falling Behind” by Juliana Horowitz, the associate research director at the Pew Research Center, and Ruth Igielnik, the senior researcher at the Pew Research Center.
Nowadays, each fraction point of a student’s GPA can now determine which school they are accepted to, and this can drive the need for more tutoring.
This trend is present across the U.S. in states like New York and California where parents will pay upwards of $200 a month for tutoring services. The pandemic further fueled parents’ desire to see their children succeed, as there was concern remote learning was harming students’ academic achievement.
“When the world shut down in March of 2020, we immediately went virtual and never stopped teaching,” Herron said. “We never skipped a beat, and parents were talking about our virtual learning groups.”
In most cases, the students who are receiving large amounts of tutoring don’t attend schools in low-income communities, nor are they competing with high-performing students in affluent neighborhoods. Pawan Dhingra, a professor of Sociology and American studies at Amherst College, calls this “hyper education” and says the majority of students in this category are either doing well in school or are even ahead of their classmates.
THE TEACHERS
At least 16 for-profit tutoring companies pop-up in a quick Google search about tutoring options for students within the HPISD boundaries. With a plethora of options, it’s no surprise that teachers feel like they are increasingly seeing students hire private tutors.
“There's a lot more options available for our students compared to other communities,” Geometry teacher Colin Stringer said. “So, I think that students are taking advantage of those options.”
Stringer believes the drive to compete causes students to seek out tutoring even when they may not need it.
“I think tutors are great, [and] I think they are a great tool, [but] I think students need to go to tutorials first or get work done in class before feeling the need to pay someone else to get caught up on work that they can do at school,” he said.
Pre-Calculus and Advanced Quantitative Reasoning teacher Jackie Hlavaty agrees.
“We are the ones that are teaching it. We are the ones creating the curriculum. We know what students have struggled with in previous years,” Hlavaty said. “We do understand that there is a time and a need for some outside tutoring, but we also, you know, want students to take the initiative and use the resources that are free before they pay.”
Like many other teachers, Hlavaty structures the use of her class time to allow built-in work time in hopes that students will ask her clarifying questions if they need it.
THE STUDENTS
Despite the attraction of outside help, some students continue to take the traditional route by attending teacher tutorials.
“I regularly go to tutorials, and I usually go for chemistry and math,” sophomore Abigail Gross said. “When you go to a tutorial by a teacher, you learn from the teacher that's teaching the information instead of somebody else who may not know what's going on in your classroom.”
Gross seeks extra help whenever she needs clarification or help before an assessment and finds the one-on-one aid in tutorials beneficial. She says the opportunity to meet one-on-one with her teacher makes tutorials more appealing than going to a tutoring session where she may not get all her questions answered.
However, freshman Anna Butler, finds that private tutoring fits her needs better than teacher provided tutorials.
“The Program prepares me very well because it allows me to see a different teacher’s perspective before the test which is super helpful,” Butler said. “The times usually work better for me as well.”
This focus on test preparation in private tutoring options, though, is exactly what makes teacher tutorials more effective to Gross.
“Teachers will explain the material, so it can be used throughout class and not just for an assessment,” she said.
Nevertheless, tutoring businesses are booming. Students promote tutoring businesses through word of mouth, bringing in more tutees.
“I heard about it through friends,” sophomore Kate Fenton said. “I have weekly tutoring sessions on Sundays, and then I go to pop-ups sometimes for tests and quizzes.”
Fenton reports higher confidence and grades since she started getting outside help.
“They explain it better, and having a smaller group is beneficial because it's easier for them to teach it,” she said.
TEACHER-TUTOR RELATIONSHIP
Though these private tutoring companies bring in large profits, it’s not the money driving the owners and their tutors to continue offering these services.
“We all love our profession so much and are 100% in it for the students,” Herron said. “We love our content areas so much, but more importantly, we love connecting and helping our students. Our goal is to see our students love our content areas like we do, and if not, at least feel confident in themselves and their learning.”
Langston has similar feelings.
I think students need to go to tutorials first or get work done in class before feeling the need to pay someone else to get caught up on work that they can do at school.
“I feel enormous personal gain that not only do students excel, but also for the parents’ confidence in our services,” Langston said. “I’m blessed that The Program can offer an additional academic lifeline of support to the already wonderful teaching students get every day at HPISD.”
Herron feels the same. She enjoys instilling academic confidence in her students and helping lightbulbs go off in their head about a previously discouraging topic.
“I have students in college constantly write to me letting me know that so much of their success they [credit] towards a great education at HPHS, but also having our continued supplemental support to lean on,” Herron said.
While both owners recognize the positive qualities of the school district, staff report feeling as if they often must compete to get their students to come to their tutorials. In her position as Section 504 Coordinator, Daphne LaMontagne encourages students to attend pre and post assessment tutorials with their teachers. She compares the relationship between private and teacher provided tutorials to an ice cream sundae.
“Private tutoring is like the cherry on top,” she said. “It’s a great addition, but without the ice cream, the cherry just falls right off. Those teacher tutorials are like ice cream.”