Tutrshootr Exclusive Article
By Tina Gao | Grade 8 | Scholastic 2022 Humor Honorable Mention
How to become a legit tutor, and get rich fast.
Zoom meeting transcript by Stan Han Yan, CEO of Tutorshootr on May 4, 2021
“You have to understand that all jobs, especially ones with high salaries, are pain.
Picture this. Every day, you wake up, then walk three feet to your bedroom desk, slap on blue light blocker glasses and jam the power button on your Dell XPS 17. Your next hour is wasted doing some middle schooler’s algebra homework while listening to his Discord bloop in sync to your typing. When he finally leaves, you lean back in your swivel chair and close your eyes, just when the next “client” (another kid who “forgot” to do his work) pops up. Multiply that by eight and you get a burning butt, crusty eyes, and a stack of homework still unfinished at 11:00 pm. But at least you made $400 to pay off your optometrist bills! And ignited the potential of pure, innocent kids, transforming them into leaders of the future. Think about the money. But also the kids.
And now for a commercial break by our sponsor, Tutrshootr! Want to teach kids, make a lot of money, but don’t want to start it yourself? Well, boy do I have an offer for you! In exchange for a six month unpaid internship, we’ll teach all the skills you need to work for Tutrshootr. But beware, this is a highly competitive program. You must be the absolute best of the best, the captain of the corps d’elite to qualify. Out of the 58 meeting participants, only 1 of you will make it, only 1 of you will become a tutor. (That’s right! I’m grading you all on a bell curve. Every word you say counts!) The good news is, if you succeed, you can make up to $30/hr! Work for Tutrshootr, make a difference, and get rich fast!
*Ahem* . Now back to business. In order to promote yourself and succeed in this hyper-competitive, cutthroat line of work, you must ask yourself not what you will teach, but how you will teach? To start, 98.6% of Tutrshootr clients are mediocre students who merely fling their homework questions at you, begging you to retrieve the answers like a dog after a stick. The trick? Bark at them to solve their own problems! It works! Gradually, you’ll encounter students flunking division in eighth grade to mastering it in first grade and everyone in between. You must acquire fifteen distinct teaching styles to communicate the core principle of “figure it out yourself!” After all, you won’t be around to tutor them forever.
Another thing you should know: no matter who your client is, I guarantee that at some point in time, you’ll need a presentation, so prepare it as soon as you can. I recommend Google Slides for rookies, but just know that real tutors like myself use Canva. By the way, making a presentation is way harder than it looks. You have to include all the concepts, make it neat, and most importantly, smother each slide with eye-catching gifs and transitions to ensure that your students don’t fall asleep. And trust me, no matter how hard you try, someone will always fall asleep (or worse, jam to that stupid Baby Shark Song on Youtube) during class.
Last but never least, rehearse and familiarize yourself with the Zoom host controls, or else.
Now on to the second half of the workshop. Let me explain why online private tutoring is much better than, say, being a real teacher at a real school. A real teacher at a real school has to wake up at 6:00am, greet those stupid kids like a meadowlark in the spring, suffer through the attendance and announcements, grade that mountain of late assignments- with only one break to eat cafeteria junk food. Enough said.
See, the thing is, as a private tutor, you can maintain a comfortable distance from your students. You even have the power to shut them up — if someone starts attacking their little sister or slamming the computer on the ground to smash a spider- you just have to click that magic microphone mute icon. Ahhh, sweet peace. And as long as you position your camera correctly, you could even get away with drinking boba tea and cuddling with your pets in bed. Who wouldn’t want a respected job that literally pays you to chill out?
But like I said before: only the best people deserve the best jobs. First, you must always ACT the determined, intelligent, generous, compassionate leader. Your credentials MUST be piled with awards, with at least one national qualification. You MUST learn how to prepare for anything: if a kid cries, if your computer deleted half your presentation, if someone screen shared cats falling into washing machines compilation #3 on top of your presentation due to a glitch. Hope for the best, expect the worst, you know the rest.
Good luck.”
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About the Author
Stan (short for Stanford) Han Yan is the CEO of the acclaimed Tutrshootr. He won the National Youth Entrepreneur of the Year for the past three consecutive years and is on the current Forbes 30 under 30 list. Stanford believes that everyone deserves a good education to unlock a spectrum of opportunities. If you have any questions, please email stanisyoman@gmail.com
