Tutoring Club: Unlocking Academic Success

With the focus in schools on testing, kids who don’t naturally perform well can end up feeling inadequate and unsuccessful. Feeling successful in school can be the first step toward a successful life.

Students who need help reaching classroom standards can get the help they need at .

Started in 2004 by five retired teachers, Scotts Valley’s Tutoring Club was taken over by its first tutor, Randy Klein, and his business partner, Pat Perkins, in 2006. Perkins handles the administrative aspects of the business while Klein oversees the tutors.

“The first couple of years were investment,” Klein said. “Then a few years of break even. The past few years have actually been profitable. This is a reputation-based business. People need to know what you are offering is bona fide and successful. It takes a while to build.”

Klein and Perkins enjoy working with Scotts Valley students, providing reading, writing and math tutoring for any student in need. While the program is designed for students in kindergarten through 12th grade, Klein said they have helped college students and college graduates who need to prepare for post-collegiate exams.

Because the tutoring programs are tailored to student needs, it is a great program for anyone who needs to achieve a level of success that they are not sure how to reach on their own.

“We work on study skills,” Klein said. In particular, “how to study to retain information so that testing isn’t so traumatic. We are flexible and work with students based on their academic needs. Experience and creativity are employed to get students to the level they need to be at to achieve goals.”

Klein and Perkins teach students that reaching their goals takes commitment and hard work.

“It isn’t magical. It’s a combination of working with them to develop self-confidence, giving them skills through instruction and repetition, and acknowledging their successes,” Klein said.

Much of the work is getting students to a place where they are more confident about their abilities. Once they get there, the academic achievements become more attainable.

“We had a first-grader who came in struggling with reading, saying ‘I can’t do this. It’s too hard.’ He would cry,” Perkins said. “We would console him. Then he started getting some wins, and it started clicking for him. Now he doesn’t need help.”

“We’ve had students who have failed their first semester of chemistry,” Klein said. “Once they learn the language of chemistry, they start making sense of it and wrapping their brain around the subject, and they ace the second semester.”

According to Klein, every subject has its own language.

“Hearing a different explanation is often the key to students understanding the subject. Sometimes you have to find several different ways to explain the same concept. We spend a lot of time with vocabulary and understanding the language and mindset. There’s also the matter of discipline. Just listening will not get you an A,” Klein said.

Perkins is dedicated to getting Tutoring Club students to make a commitment.

“They have to own it,” she said. “It helps them see the bigger picture. And, it helps them when they go out in the working world.”

The Tutoring Club of Scotts Valley is at 221 Mt. Hermon Rd. For more information, call  831-439-8886 or visit www.​tutoringclub.​com/​scottsvalleyca.