A student can be advancing well in school and suddenly reach a stumbling block.
It could be a new concept in math or more difficulty reading assignments.
Sometimes a little help from an older sibling or a parent is enough to get the child back on track.
If the student continues to struggle, however, then school becomes an unhappy place. The parents, along with the pupil, become frustrated. It may be time to consider a tutor.
In the Centre County area there are many options to obtain help with classwork. The State College School District and most others offer tutoring, both during the school day and in after school settings. The South Building of State College Area High School houses the tutoring center.
Sarah Mock is the Director of Sylvan Learning at 215 Colonade Boulevard, State College (814) 713-2052. Sylvan has over 800 locations and overs tutoring in math, reading, writing along with homework help. Bellefonte is the home of another location at 200 N. Allegheny St. (814) 933-0297.
Mathnasium at 273 Northland Center (814-238-6400) is a math tutoring center. Owners Patrick and Deborah Cusatis bring a broad range of skill sets to their business. Deb holds a B.S. in Biology, a Ph.D. in Nutrition and an M.D. from Penn State Hershey College of Medicine.
Patrick Cusatis earned a B.S. and Ph.D. in finance from The Pennsylvania State University and was an investment banker for Lehman Brothers and a portfolio manager for Corestates Bank, First Union Capital Markets and Tucker Anthony Sutro. He is an Associate Professor of Finance at Penn State Harrisburg. He stresses the importance of good math skills to his current college students and believes the Mathnasium method is a good fit for the State College area.
According to Deborah Cusatis, Mathnasium has trained instructors to help students in grades two through twelve catch up, keep up, or get ahead in math through the use of Mathnasium curriculum materials. The business also offers homework help, SAT prep and math enrichment. Students can drop into the center anytime during learning hours (Monday through Thursday 3:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. and Sunday from 1:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.
This summer Mathnasiium will be offering its First Steps class for children aged four to six. Tricia Mitchell will be teaching that class. Tricia Mitchell is the Center Director at Mathnasium. She has a B.S. in Elementary Education with a concentration in Mathematics from Kutztown University of Pennsylvania and is certified to teach Elementary Education K-6 in Pennsylvania. Tricia will teach eight one-hour-long group sessions. By using songs, games and activities, she will introduce a number of foundational math topics to the children.
Mindy and Ken Cocolin own Huntington Leaning Center at 170 Rolling Ridge Dr., Hills Plaza South, State College. Mindy is retired after 34 years of teaching. Her degree is in Early Childhood and she has also worked in Curriculum Support in the SCASD in Language Arts and Social Studies and as a Title I Math and Reading Specialist.
Mindy Cocolin says, “When a student comes in, they are given a full academic assessment. We want to look at the whole child and attempt to see where problems may be.”
Huntington uses a battery of tests to measure hand-eye coordination and reading and math skills. For younger students, the battery includes an evaluation of basic concepts and phonetic ability.
“Next we meet the parents and go over the assessment,” she explains. “We want to formulate a plan that is prescriptive for each student.”
Huntington offers tutoring for kindergarten through college. Pre-K through fourth grade is always one-on-one with a tutor. Slightly older children may need more independence and can be in a group of four or five. Even then though, the tutor works with just one child at a time on a program. All the teachers are certified. Services are available for adults returning to school, vets, English as second language students and others.
“If a college student wants tutored in Sociology, then we will find a tutor for that subject,” says Mindy Cocolin.
Ken Cocolin’s background is in business and he and Mindy owned KFCs in the past; so they are a good team together for the Huntington franchise.
The Sylvan Learning Center is located at 2134 Sandy Drive, Suites 4 and 5, State College (814) 325-9798). Sarah Mock is the Center Director.
Sylvan also initiates skills assessment testing of new students and attempts to identify strengths as well as areas for improvement. Their teachers use proven techniques according to its website and one of those is the interactive iPad-based learning system. Reports on progress are provided frequently for the student’s teacher and parents.
Upgrade Tutoring @ PSU provides mostly college student tutoring, according to Grant Elledge, owner and head tutor. Grant has a background in tutoring math, chemistry, physics, and statistics at the high school level, and math at all levels. He has done SAT and ACT prep work with students also.
“The experiences of tutoring at the collegiate level allow us to more effectively focus on the level of learning, mastery, and application of content necessary to succeed at the college level,” Grant said in an email. “If you can succeed at that level, high school and SAT work is that much easier.”
Online you can locate help as well for tutoring needs. A tutor from WyzAnt Tutoring Maureen B. said, “I am a retired teacher who moved here from Annapolis, Md. Though I wouldn’t want to return to the classroom, it is a joy to have the chance to spend one–on-one time with various students.” She describes her experiences from helping an eight-year-old with writing skills to working with high school and Penn State students to help them with French and Spanish.
“Each student is a new adventure,” she says.
